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SYNOPSIS 



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BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICES 



THSSPIS, PHRYNICHUS, PRATINAS, iESCHYLUS, SOPHOCLES, EURIP& 
DES, AND OTHER DRAMATIC POETS, 



TIME OF MENANDER, 



A DRAMATIC CHRONOLOGY 



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SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 



CONTENTS 



Page. 
Aristotle's Treatise on Poetry, - - - (Twining,) - - t) 
On the Essence of the Greek Tragedy, - (Schlegel,) - - 10 

Biographical notice of Thespis, -14 

" " " Phrynichus, - - ■-•• - ~ m *• ■ - - If 
" " " Pratinas - - - - 17 

» " u JEsCHYLUS, - - « - - - - - - 18 

" tf " Sophocles, - - * »' 21 

" " " Euripides, -----..--- 22 

The Old Comedy, -i-..----28 

" Middle Comedy, - « - - * 31 

" New Comedy, 34 

Dramatic Representations, - - -- - - ----- -35 

M Chronology, 45 



ADVERTISEMENT 



In the following synoptical Treatise on the Drama of the ancient 
Greeks, the only part taken by me is that of condensation, arrange- 
ment, and occasional translation. The "■ Theatre of the Greeks" from 
which this summary has been compiled, is a manual of erudition 
almost indispensable to graduating students in the Universities of 
England. But, for the junior classes, the volume in question is too 
elaborate. From that ample fund of classical research, I have,%ere- 
fore, endeavored to furnish a compendium o information very inter- 
esting in itself, and of easy, practical application in the prosecution 
of classical study. Nor am I without a hope that this "Synopsis" 
will prove equally intelligible and attractive to readers unacquainted 
with the Greek and Latin languages; and that it will, consequently, 
be favorably received by the patrons of polite literature, without dis- 
tinction. George Paddison. 



ORIGIN OF POETRY. 



Poetry, in general, seems to have derived its origin from two 
causes, each of them natural. 

To imitate is instinctive in man from infancy. By this he is dis- 
tinguished from other animals, that he is of all the most imitative, and 
through this instinct receives his earliest education, This is evident 
from what we view in regard to the words of imitative art ; for, in 
them, we contemplate with pleasare, and with the more pleasure the 
more exactly they are imitated, such ejects as, if real, we could not 
see without pain — as the figures meanest and most disgusting 

animals. And the reason of this '- 'tarn is a natural pleasure, 

not confined to philosophers, but Co :1 men; with this dif- 

ference only, that the multitude partake of it in a more transient 
manner. 

But this poetry, following the different characters of its authors, 
naturally divided itself into two different kinds. They who were of 
a grave and lofty spirit, chose for their imitation the actions and ad- 
ventures of elevated characters ; while poets of a lighter turn repre- 
sented those of the vicious and contemptible. 

And thus these old poets were divided into two classes — those who 
used the heroic, and those who used the iambic verse. 

And as, in the serious kind, Homer alone may be said to deserve 
the name of poet, not only on account of his other excellencies, but 
also of the dramatic spirit of his imitations ; so was he likewise the 
first who suggested the idea of Comedy, by substituting ridicule for 
invective, and giving that ridicule a dramatic cast. But when Trage- 
dy and Comedy had once made their appearance, succeeding poets, 
according to the turn of their genius, attached themselves to the one 
or the other of these new species. The lighter sort, instead of Iam- 
bic, became Comic poets ; the graver, Tragic, instead of Heroic : 
and that on account of the superior dignity and higher estimation of 
these latter forms of poetry. 

The Epic poem differs from Tragedy in the length of the plan, and 
in metre. 

Among the many just claims of Homer to our praise, this is one — 
that he is the only poet who seems to have understood what part in 



8 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

his poem it was proper for him to take himself. The poet, in his own 
person, should speak as little as possible ; for he is not then the imi- 
tator. 

Tragic poetry, as it attains more effectually the end of the art it- 
self, must deserve the preference over Epic poetry. 

fO • TIOk 



GREEK DRAMATIC POETRY. 



In stating the conception we have of ancient Tragedy to be ideal, 
we are not to understand that the different characters were all morally 
perfect. In this case what room could there be for such an opposi- 
tion or conflict as the plot of a drama requires ? Weaknesses, errors, 
and even crimes were portrayed in them ; but the manners were al- 
ways elevated above reality, and every person was invested with a 
dignity compatible with the share which he possessed in the action. 

The ideality of the representation chiefly consisted in the elevation 
to a higher sphere. 

The tragical poet wished wholly to separate the image of human- 
ity, which he exhibited to us, from the ground of nature, to which man 
is in reality chained down. 

The moral freedom of man can only be displayed in a conflict with 
the senses. 

The moral part of our nature can only be preserved amidst struggles 
and difficulties ; and if we were, therefore, to ascribe a distinctive aim 
to Tragedy, as instructive, it should be this, — that all these sufferings 
must be experienced, and all these difficulties overcome, to establish 
the claims of the mind to a divine origin, and teach us to estimate 
the earthly existence as vain and insignificant. 

I come now to another peculiarity which distinguishes the Tragedy 
of the ancients from ours ; I mean the Chorus. We must consider it 
as the personification itself of the sentiments of the poet, as the in- 
terpreter for the whole human race. 

This is the general poetical character which we must here assign 
to it, and that character is by no means affected by the circumstance 
that the Chorus had a local origin in the feasts of Bacchus, and that 
it always had a peculiar national signification with the Greeks. With 
their republican way of thinking, publicity was considered essential to 
every important transaction. As in their compositions they went 
back to the heroic ages ; they gave a certain republican cast to the 
families of their heroes, by carrying on the action, either in presence 
of the elders of the people, or those persons whose characters enti- 
tled them to respect. 
2 



10 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

This publicity does not, it fs true, correspond with Homer's picture 
of the manners of the heroic age ; but both in the costume and the 
mythology, the dramatic poetry generally displayed a spirit of inde- 
pendence and conscious liberty. 

The Chorus was, therefore, introduced to give the whole that appear- 
ance of reality which was most consistent with the fable. Whatever 
it might be in particular pieces, it represented in general, first, the 
national spirit, and then the general participation of mankind. In a 
word, the Chorus is the ideal spectator. It mitigates the impression 
of a heartrending or moving story, while it conveys to the actual 
spectator a lyrical and musical expression of his own emotions, and 
elevates him to the region of consideration. 

The modern critics have never known what to make of the Chorus ; 
and this is the less to be wondered at, as Aristotle affords no satisfac- 
tory solution of the difficulty. The business of the Chorus is better 
painted by Horace, who ascribes to it a general expression of moral 
participation, instruction, and admonition. The critics in question 
believe that the Chorus owed its continuance from the first origin of 
Tragedy, merely to accident ; and as it is easy to perceive that in 
Euripides, the last tragic poet we have, the choral songs have frequent- 
lylittle or no connexion with the fable, and form a mere episodical 
ornament, they therefore conclude that the Greeks had only to take 
one other step in dramatic art, to explode the Chorus altogether. To 
refute these superficial conjectures, it is only necessary to observe, 
that Sophocles wrote a Treatise on the Chorus in prose, in opposition 
to the principles of some other poets ; and that, far from following 
blindly the practice which he found established, like an intelligent 
artist, he could assign reasons for the system he adopted. 

Modern poets of the very first rank, since the revival of the study 
of the ancients, have often attempted to introduce the Chorus in their 
pieces, for the most part without a correct, and always without a vivid 
idea of its destination : but we have no suitable singing or dancing ; 
neither have we, as our theatres are constructed, any place for it; 
and it will hardly ever succeed, therefore, in becoming naturalized 
with us. 

The Greek Tragedy, in its pure and unaltered state, will always, 
for our theatres, remain an exotic plant, which we can hardly hope 
to cultivate with any successs, even in the hothouse of learned art and 
criticism. The Grecian Mythology, which constitutes the materials 
of ancient Tragedy, is as foreign to the minds and imaginations of 
most of the spectators, as its form and mode of representation. But 
to endeavor to constrain another subject, an historical one, for example, 



GREEK DRAMATIC POETRY. 



11 



to assume that form, must always be a most unprofitable and hopeless 
attempt. 

The Greek Tragedians paint the downfall of kingly houses without 
any reference to the condition of the people ; they show us the man 
in the 'king, and, far from veiling their heroes from our sight in their 
purple mantles, they allow us to look through their vain splendor, into 
a bosom torn and harrowed up by passions. 

That the regal pomp was not so necessary as the heroic costume is 
evident, not only from the practice of the ancients, but from the tra- 
gedies of the moderns having a reference to the throne, produced un- 
der different circumstances ; namely, the existence of monarchical 
government. They dare not draw from existing reality ; for nothing 
is less suitable for a Tragedy than a court and a court life. Where 
they do not, therefore, paint an idealldngdom, with distant manners, 
they fall into stiffness and formality, which are much more destructive 
to freedom and boldness of character, and to deep pathos, than the 
narrow circle of private life. 

The productiveness of mythology for the Tragic art we are princi- 
pally to ascribe to the principle which we observe so powerful through- 
out the whole historical range of Grecian cultivation ; namely, that the 
power which preponderated for the time assimilated every thing to it- 
self. As the heroic fables, in all their deviations, were easily develop- 
ed into the tranquil fulness and light variety of Epic poetry, they were 
afterwards adapted to the object which the Tragedians proposed to 
accomplish by earnestness, energy, and compression. And what in 
this change of destination appeared inapplicable to Tragedy, still af- 
forded materials for a sort of half sportive though ideal representation, 
in the subordinate walk of the satirical drama. 

The Homeric Epic is, in poetry, what half-raised workmanship is 
in sculpture ; and Tragedy the distinctly separated groupe. 

The poem of Homer, sprung* from the soil of the traditionary tale, is 
not yet purified from it ; as the figures of a bas-relief are borne by a 
back ground which is foreign to them. These figures appear depress- 
ed : and in the Epic poem all is painted as past and remote. In the 
bas-relief they are generally thrown into profile ; and in the Epic cha- 
racterised in the most artless manner. They are, in the former, not 
properly grouped, but follow one another; and the Homeric heroes, 
in like manner, advance singly in succession before us. It has been 
remarked, that the Iliad is not definitely closed, but that we are left 
to suppose something both to precede and follow. The bas-relief is 
equally boundless, and may be continued, ad infinitum, either from be* 
fore or behind ; on which account the ancients preferred the selection 
of those objects for it which admitted of an indefinite extension ; as 



19 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

the trains at sacrifices, dances, rows of combatants, &c. Hence they 
also exhibited bas-reliefs on round surfaces ; such as vases, or the 
frieze of a rotunda, where the two ends are withdrawn from our 
sight by the curvature; and where, on our advancing, one object ap- 
pears as another disappears. The reading of the Homeric poetry very 
much resembles such a circumgyration, as the present object alone 
arrests our attention, while that which precedes and follows is allowed 
to disappear. 

But in the distinctly formed groupe, as in Tragedy, Sculpture and 
Poetry bring before our eyes an independent and definite whole. 
To separate it from natural reality, the former places it on a base, as 
on an ideal ground. It also removes as much as possible all foreign 
and accidental accessories, that the eye may wholly rest on the essen- 
tial objects — the figures themselves. 

These figures are wrought into the most complete rounding ; yet 
they refuse the illusion of colors, and announce, by the purity and 
uniformity of the mass of which they are constructed, a creation not 
endowed with perishable life, but of a higher and more elevated 
character. 

Beauty is the object of sculpture, and repose is most advantageous 
for the display of beauty. 

Repose alone, therefore, is suitable to the figure ; but a number of 
figures can only be connected together and grouped by one action. 
The group represents beauty in motion, and the object of it is to 
combine both in the highest degree. This can only be effected when 
the artist finds means, in the most violent bodily or mental anguish, to 
moderate the expression by manly resistance, calm grandeur, or in- 
herent sweetness, in such a manner that, with the most moving truth, 
the features of beauty shall yet in nowise be disfigured. The obser- 
vation of Winkelmann on this subject is inimitable. He says, that 
beauty with the ancients was the tongue on the balance of expression ; 
and in this sense, the groupes of Niobe and Laocoon are master 
pieces ; the one in the sublime and serious, the other in the learned 
and onamental style. 

The comparison with ancient Tragedy is the more apposite here, as 
we know that both JEschylus and Sophocles produce a Niobe, and 
that Sophocles was also the author of a Laocoon. 

In Laocoon, the conflicting sufferings and anguish of the body, 
and the resistance of the soul, are balanced with the most wonderful 
equilibrium. The children calling for help, tender objects of our 
compassion, and not of our admiration, draw us back to the appear- 
ance of the father, who seems to turn his eyes in vain to the Gods. 
The convolving serpents exhibit to us the inevitable destiny which 



GREEK DRAMATIC POETRY. IS 

Unites together the characters in so dreadful a manner. And yet the 
beauty of proportion, the delightful flow of the attitude, are not lost 
in this violent struggle; and a representation, the most frightful to the 
senses, is yet treated with a degree of moderation, while a mild breath 
of sweetness is diffused over the whole. 

In the groupe of Niobe there is also the most perfect mixture of ter- 
ror and pity. The upturned looks of the mother, and the mouth half 
open in supplication, seem to accuse the invisible wrath of heaven. 

The daughter, clinging in the agonies of death to the bosom of her 
mother, in infantine innocence, can have no other fear than for her- 
self; the innate impulse of self-preservation was never represented in 
a manner more tender and affecting. Can there, on the other hand, 
be exhibited to the senses a more beautiful image of self-devoting 
heroic magnanimity than Niobe, as she bends her body forwards, that 
if possible she may alone receive the destructive bolt ? Pride and re- 
pugnance are melted down in the most ardent maternal love. The 
more than earthly dignity of the features are the less disfigured by 
pain, as, from the quick repetition of the shocks, she appears, as in 
the fable, to have become insensible and motionless. But before this 
figure, twice transformed into stone, and yet so inimitably animated-— 
before this line of demarcation of all human suffering, the most cal- 
lous beholder is dissolved in tears. 

In all the agitation produced by the sight of these groupes, there is 
still somewhat in them which invites us to composed contemplation ; 
and, in the same manner, the Tragedy of the ancients leads us, even 
in the course of the representation, to the most elevated reflections 
on our existence, and those mysteries in our destiny which can never 
wholly be explained. 



GREEK DRAMATIC WRITERS 



THESPIS. 

Thespis was a native of Icaria, a village in Attica. The precise 
date of the birth of Thespis cannot be ascertained, although all an- 
cient writes agree that he flourished about Olymp. 60, and was 
contemporary with Solon and Pisistratus. Nothing is known of his 
father and little of himself. The Arundel Marble, composed, as 
Bentley has shown, Olymp. 1*29, in the time of Ptolemy Philadel- 
phus, about 260 years B. C, declares Thespis to be the first who 
exhibited Tragedy. In this respect, the Roman writers also agree 
with the Greek, in proof of which it is only necessary to appeal to 
the well known lines of Horace : 



Ignatum tragicas genus invenisse Camense 
Dicitur, et plaustris vexisse poemata Thespis 
Qui canerent, agerentque peruncti faecibus ora.* 

As to the nature and genius of the fables of Thespis, the difficulty 
of this inquiry will be understood by whoever considers that the fables 
of Thespis are no longer remaining, and that the opinions of the an- 
cients concerning them are partly irreconcileable with probability, 
partly somewhat obscure. All modern writers, however, have collect- 
ed from them so much, that the arguments of those fables were scarce- 
ly removed from the levity of the Satyric. Admitting this to be partly 
true, they appear to have been so far mistaken, as to imagine, while 
engaged in disquisitions as to the origin of Tragedy, that Thespis 
himself never improved upon his first attempts, which is very unlike- 
ly ; since during his theatrical career he had ample time to correct, in 
some degree, the rudeness of form which it derived from its birth. 
He was without doubt the first who stripped the Chorus of their Satyric 
garb, and connected them more closely with the actor. 



* See, also, Athenaeus, lib. 1. cap. 10. Plutarch, Life of Solon, cap. 29, who is 
there express in vindicating to Thespis the honor of this invention. 



GREEK DRAMATIC WRITERS — THESPIS. 15 

All things which have come down to. us, concerning Thespis, being 
well considered, it would seem that Tragedy through him underwent 
three changes ; two of which relate to the period of Solon, and the 
third to that of the Pisistratidae. What the first of these changes was, 
is evident from the nature of the Satyric Choruses. The Chorus hav- 
ing sung the Dithyramb, and uttered their extemporal effusion, Tespis, 
when they were fatigued by exertion, came forward himself and re- 
lieved the singers, by relating and gesticulating some story which un- 
doubtedly had Bacchus as its subject. Shortly after, which was the 
second change, he began to act the parts of heroes, either retaining 
the chorus of Satyrs or introducing them in another garb. 

This second change appears to have taken place about Olymp. 64; 
from which period, until Olymp. 61, Thespis ceased to exhibit Fables, 
being restrained from so doing by the law enacted by Solon, as Dio- 
genes Laertius says, and to which law Pisistratus is reported to have 
been unfriendly. But as soon as the Pisistratidae had obtained the 
chief power, Thespis doubtlessly introduced a third change, exhibit- 
ing Tragedy under a more perfect form, and contending with other 
poets for the Tragic prize. Among the competitors for this honor, 
Phrynichus would be one, being then about thirty years of age. The 
Pulpitum, or that part where the actors stood, would be enlarged and 
better decorated, and the deeds of heroes represented with the accom- 
paniments of flutes and dances. The Arundel Marble clearly shows 
that the Dramatic contest appertained to the age of Thespis, to which 
testimony may be added a passage from the Vespae, v. 1470. 

It is manifest that, by such contests, Dramatic Poetry would, in a 
short time, make great advances ; and at this period, perhaps, it was» 
that Thespis exhibited those pieces, of which now only the names are 
extant, and from which, most probably, the fragment,* preserved by 
Clemens Alexandrinus, is extracted. ' As to that argument against it, 
from the letters not having at that time been increased to the number 
of twenty-four, it is not sufficiently made out, so as to overthrow this 
opinion. When Thespis first exhibited, the number of the letters was 
not complete ; but in his later representations, after a lapse of twenty- 
five years, he would use these characters, since the number was then 
perfected ; for at Olymp. 61, Simonides, their inventor, was sixteen 
years of age. This, however, was not the latest period of Thespis, 
but only that in which he first, perhaps, entered the dramatic contest ; 
for in Olymp. 67, according to Suidas, in his testimony of Phrynicus, 



* This fragment in four artificial words comprehends the twenty-four letters of 
the Greek Alphabet. 



16 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

he gained a victory. At this period, all the letters were invented. 
Hence may be drawn the following conclusions : 
Thespis — Was the inventor of Tragedy; 

Committed nothing to writing; 

That his pieces were not all Satyric ; 

That his latest period was after Olymp. 61. 



PHRYNICHUS 

Was the scholar of Thespis, older than iEschylus, and contempo- 
rary with him during a part of his theatrical career. 

It is pretty generally allowed that Phrynichus and iEschylus were 
the first who forsook the ludicrous style, and became the inventors of 
serious Tragedy ; yet while iEschylus is universally regarded as the 
father of Tragedy, the merits of his successful competitor, Phrynichus, 
do not seem to have been duly appreciated. It is sufficiently proba- 
ble that his piece entitled* the " Taking of Miletus" must have been 
something beyond a rude attempt at Tragedy to have produced that 
effect which it did upon the spectators : for, according to the account 
of Herodotus, " when Phrynichus exhibited his play, the Taking of 
" Miletus, the whole theatre fell into tears, and fined the poet a thou- 
sand drachms; and made an order that nobody ever after should 
"make a play of that subject." It is also probable that the represen- 
tation was exhibited on a stage of a very different kind from that used 
by Thespis, the expression of Herodotus — the theatre — favoring the 
opinion that some approaches towards a regular stage were made in 
the time of Phrynichus. 

The Chorus in the Taking of Miletus most likely consisted of cap- 
tive Milesian Women ; as in the Phcenissae it most probably did of 
Phoenician women, the wives of those Poehnicians, who, by order of 
Xerxes, were beheaded after the battle of Salamis. In the Taking of 
Miletus the Chorus would probably represent the widows of those 
slain in the affair. The Chorus ceasing, the chief men of the city 
would advance upon the stage and recount their past and present 
miseries. This part of the representation Mr. Schneider imagines to 
have been performed by a single actor personating a variety of char- 
acters. 

Phrynichus obtained the Tragic prize with his Phoenissae, Olymp. 
71. Adverting to this circumstance, Mr. Schneider, who labors to 
procure greater honors for the dramatic authors prior to iEschylus than 
what many are disposed to admit, takes an opportunity to contend 



GREEK DRAMATIC WRITERS — PHRYNICHUS — PRATINAS. 17 

that he who had iEschylus for a rival, and over whom he was victori- 
ous, must have possessed dramatic merits of a very distinguished 
character. After citing the passage from Plutarch's Life of Themis- 
tocles, in which his victory is commemorated, he observes that JEschy- 
lus himself was accused of having pilfered from the Tragedies of 
Phrynichus, adducing a passage from The Frogs of Aristophanes, v. 
1334, where iEschylus attempts to exculpate himself from the charge 
of plagiarism. Nor does this charge appear to have been made with- 
out foundation ; for Glaucus, who wrote on the subject of this Trage- 
dian, has boldly asserted, as the Author of the Argument to the 
Persce tells us, that this play was pilfered from those of Phrynichus. 
In two departments of the scenic art Phrynichus appears to have 
been eminently successful. To him, also, has been assigned the 
invention of the tetrameter verse, but erroneously ; for, long before 
Phrynichus, Archilochus and Solon used this kind of verse, and, as 
Aristotle appears to relate, all the Tragic writers before iEschylus. 



PRATINAS. 

Eurebius, in his Chronicles, as well as other Authors, assures us 
that Pratinus flourished about Olymp. 70. Little is known about him, 
and for that we are indebted to Suidas. Dr. Blomfield, in his Pre- 
face to the Persce, considers it doubtful whether he ever exhibited 
Tragedy at all ; and it is elsewhere remarked by the same authority, 
that Pratinas, confining himself to ludicrous fables, while Phrynichus 
and iEschylus adopted doleful stories, and being the first that com- 
mitted his pieces to writing, gave occasion to his being considered as 
the inventor of the Satyric Drama. Schneider considers the words 
of Suidas, in styling him the first to write Satyrics, as referable to those 
Satires which were afterwards composed by the Tragedians, and that 
Pratinas enjoys the reputation of being the inventor of this species of 
Drama, from the circumstance of his having improved upon the rude 
essays of its first origin. There were not wanting some, however, 
who confounded the Satires of Pralinas with those more ancient far- 
ces, from which the Phliasians took occasion to assert their claim to 
the invention of Tragedy. From the testimony of two epigrams upon 
Sophocles, Anthol. Gr. 1, 2, it is evident in what honor the Satyric 
Chorus was held by the Phliasians. There is certainly no mention 
of Pratinas, but they evidently relate to him and his son, both being 
highly honored by the Phliasians. 
3 



18 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

Nothing scarcely of Pratinas has come down to us, but a fragment 
preserved by Athenaeus, lib. 11. 

Two other Tragic Poets belong to the age of Pratinas, — Choerilus 
and Carcinus. The first of these, according to Suidas, composed a 
hundred and fifty Dramas, all of which have perished. He appears 
to have been a very indifferent poet, and is never mentioned by an- 
cient writers but in terms of reproof. 

Of Carcinus the few particulars which are known are mentioned by 
Dr. Bentley, in his Dissertation on the Age of Tragedy, who there 
states him to have been an ancient Tragic poet, burlesqued once or 
twice by Aristophanes for a certain humor of dancing ; that he had 
three sons, whom he brought up to dance in his choruses, and who, 
upon that account, are, among many other nicknames, there called 
dancers. 



iESCHYLUS. 

iEscHYLus, son of Euphorion, was born Olymp. 63, 4, (B. C. 525,) 
and died, according to the Arundel Marble, Olymp. 80, 1. Bacchus 
is said, in fable, to have appeared to him, and commanded him to write 
Tragedies. This design he began to execute in Olymp. 70, being 
then 25 years of age. The next notice which we have of him is at 
Olymp. 72, 3, when he was present at Marathon, being then in his 
35th year. In this action iEschylus greatly distinguished himself, as 
well as his two brothers Cynaegiras and Amyrnias ; and in a picture 
representing the battle, iEschylus was drawn encouraging the soldiers, 
thereby being associated in the same honor that was paid to Miltiades. 
Cynaegirus was afterwards one of the ten Commanders, who, with a 
naval armament of 1,000 men, defeated 30,000 Persians. Six years 
after the memorable day of Marathon, iEschylus gained his first 
Tragic victory ; and four years after this, viz. Olymp. 75, was fought 
the battle of Salamis, in which iEschylus nobly defended his surviving 
brother Amyrnias, who had his hand lopped off by a Persian sabre. 
Upon this occasion the Athenians decreed him the first honors ; and 
in the following year he acquired fresh glory in the battle of Plataaa, 
where the brave General Mardonius was slain. Eight years after this 
he gained the victory with the Persce. The Supplices was acted be- 
r ore the Persce, but its precise date is not determined by any chrono- 
logical testimony. Dr. Blomfield, in his Preface to the Persce, p. 15, 
has arranged the remaining dramas of our Author in the following 
order : — Supplices, Persce, Prometheus, Septem contra Thebas, Aga- 
memnon, Choephori, Eumenides. The last three, with Proteus added 



GREEK DRAMATIC WRITERS — * JESCHYLUS. 19 

'. to them as a Satyric Drama, composed what was called the Orestean 
tetralogy, the representation of which took place at Olmp. 80, % 

iEschylus survived the representation of this tetralogy little more 
than two years, since he died at the court of Hiero, king of Sicily, 
. Olymp. 81, (B. C. 456,) aged 69 years. 

The few last years of his life are involved in considerable obscurity; 
and various are the reasons which have been assigned for his leaving 
Athens. Jealousy of the preference given to Sophocles — which is 
the account given by Plutarch. The victory obtained over him by 
Simonides is an elegiac contest^but Simonides died Olymp. 77, 4. 
The offence which he gave to the city, by the representation of the 
Eumenides, and in consequence of which he was accused of impiety ; 
upon which occasion his brother Amyrnias pleaded his cause, and 
iEschylus was acquitted. The common story respecting the Eume- 
nides is, that the appearance of the fifty Furies on the stage, wearing 
masks of a hideous paleness, their hands brandishing lighted torches, 
and their hair braided with serpents, caused such extreme terror 
among the spectators, that women were seized with the pains of pre- 
mature labor, and children died from fear ; and that the magistrates, 
to prevent such fatal occurrences in future, ordained that the Chorus 
should hereafter be limited to fifteen. The first part of this account 
Dr. Blomfield, in his Preface to the Persos, throws aside as fabulous ; 
and observes, that fifty Furies would not cause more terror than fifteen, 
since the horror arising from the spectacle would not depend so much 
upon the number of the Chorus, as it would upon their appointments, 
viz., masks, torches, and twisted snakes ; and that, so far from fifteen 
Furies being brought upon the stage by iEschylus, it is most likely 
there were only three ; since it is altogether incredible that the poet 
should be so rash as to invade the received mythology of a supersti- 
tious country by augmenting the number of those goddesses from 
three to fifty, whom the Athenians regarded with an awful veneration. 
It has already been observed of -iEschylus, by Aristotle, that " he re- 
trenched the Chorus;" upon which Mr. Twining remarks, that the 
critic would hardly have expressed himself thus, had he meant a re- 
trenchment in the number of choral performers ; but the sense is, that 
he abridged the choral parts, which were immoderately long, and made 
the Chorus more subservient to the main interest of the fable. In the 
passage of Aristotle, alluded to above, another improvement is com- 
memorated of iEschylus — his introduction of two actors upon the 
stage, which was, in fact, to introduce the Dialogue. Mr. Tyrwhitt, 
in his notes on the passage, observes that iEschylus certainly intro- 
duced three actors into some of his plays. But he thinks that he bor- 
rowed the hint from Sophocles, by whom he was worsted in a Tragi© 



20 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

contest at least twelve years before his death.* In the 7th chap, of 
the Poetics, the invention of painted scenery is ascribed to Sophocles ; 
but to iEschylus, by the Author of his Life. To adjust exactly the 
rival claims of iEschylus and Sophocles with respect to the decora- 
tion of the Tragic Stage, would be a desperate undertaking. Some 
accounts are so liberal to iEschylus as scarce to leave his successors 
any room for farther improvements. They give him paintings, ma- 
chinery, altars, tombs, trumpets, ghosts, and furies : to which others 
add a very singular species of improvement, the exhibition of drunken 
men. This last is taken from Athenaeus, who goes a little farther into 
the origin of the improvement, assigning as the reason of iEschylus 
exhibiting drunken characters, that he always composed his tragedies 
when drunk, and introduces Sophocles as reproving him on this ac- 
count. He is likewise commemorated by the same Author as being 
the inventor of the Tragic Robe, which the Priests of Ceres after- 
wards adopted. He also invented many species of dances ; teaching 
the Chorus the various figures, which they were to exhibit on the stage, 
and, in a word, taking upon himself the whole economy of Tragedy. 
iEschylus certainly invented the mask ; also the buskins ; both of 
which inventions are acknowledged by Horace : 

Posthunc (Thespin) personam, pallaeque repertor honestae 
iEschylus, et docuit magnumque loqui nitique cothurno. 

In so great honor was the memory of this illustrious Author held 
at Athens, that a decree of the people permitted any Poet to aspire 
to the crown, with one of the pieces of iEschylus retouched and cor- 
rected as he might judge proper. The writer of his Life has preser- 
ved an epitaph, supposed to be from the hand of the poet himself. 
It is remarkable for its modesty, recording no other circumstance of 
his life than that of his gallant conduct at Marathon. 

The style of iEschylus has not escaped the censure of ancient wri- 
ters. The boldness of his figures, and the novelty of his expressions, 
are noticed by Dionysius Halicarnassus. This is also alluded to by 
Aristophanes, in the Frogs, where he is rallied upon his affectation of 
compound words ; which are compared, in that inimitable Comedy, to 



* The following remark of Mr. Elmsley is transcribed from the Quarterly Re- 
view, vol. 7, p. 449 : " The actors were not only assigned by lot to the several com- 
petitors, but the number was limited to three, which each competitor was allowed 
to employ. Inconsequence of this regulation, when three characters were already 
on the stage, a fourth could not be introduced without allowing one of the three 
actors time to retire and change his dress. The poet was at liberty to employ as 
many mutes as he thought proper.'* 



GREEK DRAMATIC WRITERS SOPHOCLES. 21 

the proud towers that overlook the ramparts of a city. This is the 
piece in which Euripides and Sophocles are represented as contend- 
ing in the infernal regions before Bacchus for the throne of Tragedy, 
which is, in the sequel, awarded to JEschylus. 

The following is the character given of iEschylus by Quintilian — a 
comparison being instituted between the respective merits of JEschy- 
lus and Euripides : 

Tragaedias primus in lucem jiEschylus protulit, sublimus et gravis et grandiloquus 
soepe usque ad vitium, sed rudis in plerisque et incompositus : propter quod correc- 
tas ejus fabulas in certamen deferre posterioribus poetis Athenienses permisere, sunt- 
que eodem modo multi coronati. Sed longe clarius illustraverunt hoc opus Sopho- 
cles atque Euripides : quorum in dispari dicendi via uter sit poeta melior, inter plu- 
rimos quaeritur. Illud quidem nemo non fateatur necesse est, iis qui se ad agendum 
comparent, utiliorem longe Euripidem fore. Namque is et in sermone (quod ipsum 
reprehendunt, quibus gravitas et cothurnus et sonus Sophoclis videtur esse sublimior) 
magis accedit oratorio generi; et sententiis densus, et in iis quae a sapientibus tradita 
sunt, pene ipsis par et in dicendo ac respondendo cuilibet eorum, qui fuerunt in foro 
diserti, comparandus. 

In affectibus vero cum omnibus mirus, turn in iis qui miseratione constant, facile 
praecipuus. — lib. 10. c. 1. 



SOPHOCLES. 

Sophocles, son of Sophilus, native of Colonus, was born Olymp. 
71, 2. (B. C. 495.) Diodorus relates that he died about the same 
time as Socrates, viz., in the third year of Olymp. 93, aged ninety. 
He was, therefore, thirty years junior to JEschylus, and fifteen years 
older than Euripides. He was early distinguished for the attractive 
beauty of his form ; and we learn that after the battle of Salamis, he 
headed a Chorus of youths, being then in his fifteenth year, and re- 
ceived the applause of the Athenians for his skill on the lyre. He 
had been taught music and dancing, according to Athenaeus, by 
Lamprus, and throughout his career we frequently hear of his excel- 
lence in these arts. It is related that he performed on the harp during 
the representation of his Thamyris, and at that of his Nausicaa : his 
skill with the ball was very great. We have the authority of Suidas 
for saying, that in early life he first applied himself to Lyric Poetry, 
but his genius soon led him to the haunts of the Dramatic muse, and 
his first success fixed him there forever. He was in his twenty-seventh 
year when he competed with iEschylus for the possession of the stage. 
After the representation of the pieces, the suffrages of the Judges 
were divided, and the Theatre becoming clamorous for a decision, 
Cimon.who was then in the zenith of his fame, was appointed to name 



22 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

the victor. Having taken the usual oaths to judge impartially, and 
performed the customary libations on the Altar of Bacchus, Cimon 
awarded the first place to Sophocles. In Olymp. 85, 2, we find him 
employed in the Samian war ; on which occasion he was associated 
with Pericles, as one of the ten Generals who were elected every 
year. 

The last and next recorded event of our poet's life was his victory 
with the Philoctetes, Olymp. 82, 4, and four years previous to his 
death, according to the Parian Marbles, in the Archonship of Callias, 
Olymp. 83, 4, after a glorious career, during which, according to Sui- 
das, he gained twenty-four, to Diodorus Siculus, eighteen Tragic 
victories. The story of his being accused of madness, in his old age, 
by an ungrateful son, and of his refuting the charge by reading before 
his judges certain passages of his (Edipus Coloneus, which he had 
just finished, is so well known as to require but a brief mention. 
Cicero de Sen. cap. 7, and Valerius Maximus, lib. 8, will afford the 
best detail. This celebrated Tragedy, the last production of our 
Poet, written expressly to gratify the Athenians, and to commemorate 
the place of his own birth, was first represented by the grandson of 
Sophocles, Olymp. 84, 4. 

The number of pieces which Sophocles composed is still a contested 
point among the learned. The account of Suidas states them to have 
been 123. But Suidas also gives us the computation of Aristophanes 
the Grammarian, who states them to have been 130, seventeen of 
which he deems spurious. Boeckius rejects both these accounts, 
referring a part of this number to his son Jophon, and part to the 
younger Sophocles. The following are all that are now extant, and 
undoubtedly assignable to the elder Sophocles : (Edipus Rex, (Edipus 
Coloneus, Electra, Antigone, Trachinice, Ajax, Philoctetes. 



EURIPIDES. 

This poet was born at Salamis, Olymp. 75, (B. C. 480,) under the 
Archonship of Callias, and upon the same day on which the Athenians 
gained their victory over the Persian fleet. According to one au- 
thority, he was the son of Mnestarchus a vintner ; his mother, Cleito, 
being an herb woman. In early life, he embarked in the profession 
of an Athletes, the profits of which were received by his father. His 
inclination soon led him to cultivate Tragedy, and he became a disci- 
ple of Anaxagoras, Prodicus, and Protagoras. 



GREEK DRAMATIC .WRITERS — EURIPIDES. 23 

Suidas, however, says, it is not true that his mother sold herbs, but 
that he was descended of a noble family. In early life, according to 
the same author, he was a painter — that he first applied himself to 
Tragedy when he saw his master, Anaxagoras, brought to trial on ac- 
count of his Philosophic opinions. Although accounted a woman- 
hater, he nevertheless was twice married; his first wife being Chcerina, 
daughter of Mnesilochus, who brought him three sons, Mnesilochus, 
Mnesarchides, and Euripides. Having divorced his first wife, on 
account of adultery, he appears to have been no less unfortunate in 
the choice of his second ; whose name, however, Suidas has not 
mentioned. He also omits to notice his temporary settlement in 
Magnesia; where he was received as a public guest. After alluding 
to the well-known story of his being torn to pieces by dogs, at the 
instance of two poets, who were envious of his fame, Suidas says 
others relate that he was torn to pieces by women. 

Euripides was the intimate friend of Socrates, who, according to 
iElian, was seldom a spectator at the theatre, except when a play of 
our poet was represented. His first piece was produced at Olymp. 
81, being at that time in his twenty-fifth year. Olymp/ 84, 4, he 
gained the prize in Tragedy, on which occasion he was the first 
placed. 

The MS. Life, given by Elmsley, so far agrees with Suidas in say- 
ing that he was twice married; the name of his first wife being 
Melito, (Suid. Chcsrina,) that of his second Choerila. When, or for 
what reason, he left Athens, does not appear. The MS. Life states 
he moved into Magnesia, and thence into Macedonia, where he gained 
the favor of Archelaus, in whose dominions he died, Olymp. 93, 3, in 
the Archonship of Callias, at the age of seventy-five. He was buried 
in Macedonia, but a Cenotaph was erected to him at Athens, inscribed 
with a highly eulogistic epigram. 

11 When we consider Euripides by himself," says Schlegel, " with- 
out any comparison with his predecessors ; when we take a separate 
view of some of his better pieces, and detached scenes throughout 
the others, we cannot refuse to him an extraordinary degree of praise. 
But, on the other hand, when we place him in connexion with the 
history of art, when we consider his pieces as a whole, and reflect on 
the object, which he appears in general to have had in view, in all 
the works which have come down to us, we are compelled to bestow 
severe censure on him on various accounts. Of few writers may both 
good and evil be said with so much truth. He was a man of infinite 
ingenuity, and practised in the greatest variety of mental arts ; but 
neither the sublime seriousness of mind, nor the severe wisdom which 
we revere in JEschylus and Sophocles, regulated in him a luxuriant 



24 SYNOPSIS OP THE GREEK DRAMA.. 

fulness of the most splendid and amiable qualities. His constant 
aim is to please, by whatever means, and hence he is so very unequal 
to himself. We possess some cutting sayings of Sophocles respect- 
ing Euripides ; though he was so far from being actuated by any 
think like the jealousy of authorship, that he mourned his death, and, 
in a piece which was shortly after exhibited, refused to his actors the 
ornament of the floral crown. The derisory attacks of Aristophanes 
are well known, though not sufficiently understood and appreciated.* 

In Euripides we no longer find the essence of the ancient Tragedy 
in its pure and unmixed state. We have already placed this es- 
sence, in the prevailing idea of Destiny, in the ideality of the com- 
position, and in the signification of the Chorus. Euripides inherited, 
it is true, the idea of Destiny from his predecessors, and his belief of 
it was sharpened by the Tragic practice ; but yet in him Fate is seldom 
the invisible spirit of the whole composition, the radical Thought of 
the Tragic world. We have seen that this idea may be exhibited 
under severer or milder aspects; that the obscure terror of Destiny 
may, in the connexion of a whole trilogy, be cleared up to the signifi- 
cation of a wise and beneficent Providence. Euripides, however, has 
drawn it down from the region of the infinite ; and inevitable neces- 
sity not unfrequently degenerates in him into the caprice of accident. 
He can no longer, therefore, give it its proper and peculiar direction, 
namely, by contrast and opposition to elevate the moral liberty of 
man. His characters generally suffer because they must, and not be- 
cause they will. 

The mutual subordination of character and passion to ideal eleva- 
tion, which we find observed in the same order in Sophocles, Euripi- 
des has completely reversed. Passion is the principal object with 
him; his next care is for character; and when these endeavors leave 
him still any remaining room, he occasionally seeks to connect gran- 
deur and dignity with the more frequent display of amiable attrac- 
tions. 

It has been already admitted that the persons in Tragedy ought not 
to be all equally exempt from error, as there would then be no oppo- 
sition among them 9 , and consequently no room for a plot. But Euri- 
pides has, as Aristotle observes, frequently painted his characters in 
black colors without any necessity, as, for example, his Menelaus in 
Orestes. He was warranted by the traditions in attributing great 



* In the Nubes, he is ridiculed for debasing the dignity of Tragedy, by clothing 
his chief characters in rags, and reducing them to beggary. 



GREEK DRAMATIC WRITERS EURIPIDES. £5 

crimes to many of the old heroes, but he invented besides many base 
and paltry traits for them, of his own free invention. 

The Chorus is, for the most part, in him, an unessential ornament; 
its songs are frequently wholly episodical, without any reference to the 
action, and more distinguished for brilliancy than for sublimity and 
true inspiration. We must consider the Chorus, says Aristotle, as 
one of the actors, and as a part of the whole ; it must enter into 
the action ; not as in Euripides, but as Sophocles has done. 

In the accompanying music, he adopted all the innovations invent- 
ed by Timotheus, and selected those melodies which were most in 
unison with the effeminacy of his poetry.* He proceeded in the same 
manner with his syllabic measures ; his versification is luxuriant and 
breaks through every rule. The same diluted and effeminate charac- 
ter would, on a more profound investigation, be unquestionably found 
to belong also to the rhythmi of his choral songs. t 

Euripides was a frequenter of the schools of the philosophers; and 
he displays a particular vanity in introducing philosophical doctrines 
on all occasions; in my opinion, in a very imperfect manner, as we 
should not be able to understand these doctrines from him if we were 
not beforehand acquainted with them.f He conceives it too vulgar 
a thing to believe in the gods in the simple manner of the people ; 
and he, therefore, seizes every opportunity of interspersing something 
of their Allegorical signification, and of giving his spectators to under- 
stand that the nature of his own belief was problematical. 

We may distinguish in him a two-fold character; the poet whose 
productions were consecrated to a religious solemnity, which existed 
under the protection of religion, and which was therefore under a re- 
ciprocal obligation of returning that protection with honor and rever- 
ence ; and the sophist, with his philosophical dicta, who endeavors to 
introduce his sceptical opinions and doubts into the fabulous prodigies 
connected with the religion from which he derived the subjects of his 
pieces. He throws out a multitude of moral maxims, many of which 



* Sophocles chiefly employed th« Phrygian Melody, which is best adapted, ac- 
cording to Plato, to inspire moderation and to express our worship of the Deity.- — 
De Rep. lib. 3. 

f See the passage in the Ranee, v. 1332, wherein he is recommended to adopt the 
use of a pair of shells, instead of the lyre, as the most fitting accompaniment for his 
songs. 

X We find, as Valckenoer observes, the system of Anaxagoras on the origin of 
Beings, as well as the precepts of that morality which Socrates inculcated. Hence 
it was that he had so many partisans among the philosophers, who were glad to 
fe*ve their doctrines brought upon the itage, end applauded by the spectator*. 
4 



£6 synopsis or tmb greek drama. 

he often repeats, and for the most part they are either trite or funda- 
mentally false. With all this moral ostentation, the aim of his pieces, 
the general impression which they are calculated to produce, is some- 
times extremely immoral. An anecdote is told of him, that he intro- 
duced Bellerophon with a silly eulogium on wealth, in which he pre- 
ferred it to all domestic happiness, and ended with observing, if Aph- 
rodite (who bore the appellation of golden) shone like gold, she was 
deserving of the love of mortals; and that the spectators took umbrage 
at this, and wished to stone both actor and poet. Euripides then 
sprang forward, and called out, " Wait till the end, he will be requited 
accordingly!" In like manner he defended himself against the ob- 
jection that his Ixion expressed himself in too disgusting and abomi- 
nable language, by observing that the piece concluded with his being 
broken on the wheel. But the assistance of poetical justice, in pun- 
ishing the baseness of his characters, is not always called in. In some 
of his pieces, the wicked escape altogether untouched. Lies and 
other infamous practices are openly protected, especially when he can 
assign for them a supposed noble motive. The following verse in 
justification of perjury is well known : 

The tongue swore, but the sense swore not. — Hippolyt. 608. 

In the connexion in which this verse is uttered, and on account of 
which he has been so often ridiculed by Aristophanes, there is indeed 
a justification ; but the formula is nevertheless bad, on account of the 
possible abuse of its application. He was the first poet that ever 
thought of making the unbridled passion of a Medea, and the unna- 
tural love of a Phcedra, the principal subject of his dramas ; yet with 
all this importance which he has communicated to his female parts, 
he is notoriously famed for his hatred of women. 

The style of Euripides is upon the whole too loose, although he has 
many happy images and ingenious turns: it has neither the dignity 
nor the energy of the style of iEschylus, nor the chaste sweetness of 
that of Sophocles. In his expressions he frequently affects the singu- 
lar and uncommon, though at other times he becomes too familiar, 
and the tone of discourse assumes a confidential appearance, and de- 
scends from the elevation of the cothurnus to the level ground. In 
this respect, he was a precursor of the New Comedy — hence Menan- 
der expressed a most marked admiration for him, and proclaimed him- 
self his scholar. The opinion of Aristophanes, his contemporary, 
forms a striking contrast with this adoration. Aristophanes persecutes 
him unceasingly, with the utmost bitterness : he seems as if he were 
appointed to be his constant scourge — yet he never attacks Sophocles ; 
and even when he takes the part of JEschylus, at which we can hard- 



GREEK DRAMATIC WRITERS — EURIPIDES, 27 

ly help smiling, his reverence for him is still visible, and he takes every 
opportunity of contrasting his gigantic powers with the petty refine- 
ment of Euripides. 

Notwithstanding these observations, we must never forget that 
Euripides was still a Grecian, and the contemporary of many of the 
greatest names of Greece, in politics, philosophy, history, and the 
plastic arts. He has a particular strength in portraying the errors of 
a diseased soul — pursuing, even to madness, the passions of which it 
is the slave. He is admirable where the object calls chiefly for emo- 
tion, and requires the display of no higher qualities; and he is still 
more so where pathos and moral beauty are united. It is by no means 
my intention to deny him the possession of the most astonishing ta- 
lents; I have only stated that these talents were not united with a 
mind in which the austerity of moral principles, and the sanctity of 
religious feelings, were held in the highest honor. 



he 



THE OLD COMEDY 



Comedy, at its commencement, namely, in the hands of its Doric 
founder, Epicharmus, borrowed its materials chiefly from the mythical 
world. Even in its maturity, it appears not to have renounced this 
choice altogether, as we may see from many of the titles of the lost 
pieces of Aristophanes and his contemporaries ; and at a later period, 
in the interval between the Old and New Comedy, for particular rea- 
sons, it returned again to mythology with a peculiar degree of predi- 
lection. But as the contrast between the materials and the form is 
here in its proper place, and nothing can be more directly opposed to 
the exhibition of the ludicrous than the most important and serious 
concerns of men, the peculiar subject of the Old Comedy was natu- 
rally therefore taken from public life and the state : it is altogether po- 
litical ; and the private and family life, beyond which the New never 
soars, was only introduced occasionally and indirectly, with a refer- 
ence to the public. The Chorus is therefore essential to it, as being 
in some sort a representation of the public: it must by no means be 
considered as something accidental, which we may account for in the 
local origin of Old Comedy ; we may assign as a more substantial 
reason, that it belongs to the complete parody of the Tragic form. 
It contributes also to the expression of that festal gladness, of which 
Comedy was the most unrestrained effusion. For in all the popular 
and religious festivals of the Greeks, choral songs, accompanied by 
dancing, were exhibited. The Comic Chorus transforms itself occa- 
sionally into such an expression of public joy ; as, for instance, when 
the women who celebrate the Thesmophorias, in the piece that bears 
that name, in the midst of the most amusing drolleries, begin to chaunt 
their melodious hymn in honor of the gods of the festival, in the same 
manner as took place on a real occasion. At these times we observe 
such a display of sublime Lyric Poetry, that the passages may be 
transplanted into Tragedy without any change or modification. The 
most remarkable peculiarity of the Comic Chorus is the Parabasis, an 
address to the spectators by the Chorus, in the name and under the 
authority of the poet, which has no concern with the subject of the 
piece. Sometimes he enlarges on his own merits, and ridicules the 
pretensions of his rivals; at other times he avails himself of his rights 



THE OLD COMEDfi ffl 

as an Athenian citizen, to deliver in every assembly of the people pro- 
posals of a serious or ludicrous nature for the public good. The Par- 
abasis may, strictly speaking, be considered as repugnant to the essence 
of dramatic representation : for in the Drama, the poet should always 
disappear behind the characters ; and these characters ought to dis- 
course and act as if they were alone, and without any perceptible re- 
ference to the spectators. 

We have now but one Comic writer of the old kind ; and we cannot, 
therefore, in forming an opinion of his merits, derive any assistance 
from a comparison with other masters. Aristophanes had many pre- 
decessors ; Magnes, Cratinus, Crates, and others. He was indeed 
one of the latest Comic authors, as he survived even the Old Come- 
dy itself. We have no reason, however, to believe that we witness its 
decline in him ; for in all probability the Old Comedy was still rising 
in merit, and he himself one of its most perfect poets. It was very 
different with the Old Comedy, and with Tragedy ; the latter died a 
natural, the former a violent death. Tragedy ceased to exist, because 
that species of poetry seemed to be exhausted — because it was aban- 
doned — and because ho person could again rise to the same elevation. 
Comedy was deprived by the hand of power of that unrestrained free- 
dom which was necessary to its existence. Horace, in a few words, 
informs us of this catastrophe : 

Successit vetus his Comcedia, non sine multa 
Laude, sed in vitium libertas excidit, et vim 
Dignam lege regi : lex est accepta : chorusqu© 
Turpiter obticuit, sublato jure nocendi. 

The period comprehended within the range of the Old Comedy be- 
gins with Epicharmus, Olymp. 70, (B. C. 500,) and concludes about 
Olymp. 100 (B. C. 375) ; the poets Strattis and Theopompus being 
among the latest writers of the Old Comedy. 



CRATINUS 

Was the author of twenty-one Plays, and gained the victory nine 
times, according to Suidas. He was born Olymp. 65, 1, and died at 
an advanced age, about Olymp. 89. He is described as having pos- 
sessed all the bitterness of Archilochus, together with the energy and 
fire of iEschylus. The titles and fragments of about twenty of hia 
plays are to be found in Athenaaus, 



30. SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

EUPOLIS 

Was born about Olymp. 83; first began tp exhibit Olymp. 87, 3, 
being then only 17 years of age. He copied Cratinus, but was reck- 
oned to have possessed more elevation and amenity. Suidas says he 
wrote seventeen Plays, and gained the victory seven time? ; but he is 
doubtless mistaken, since many more than seventeen are mentioned 
by ancient writers. 



ARISTOPHANES. 

The notice of this poet by Suidas is very short and incorrect ; he 
makes him a Rhodian or Lindian by birth, his father's name being 
Philip. His Plays were fifty-four. Titles and fragments of nearly 
this number, are to be found in Athenaeus. He first exhibited Comedy 
at Olymp. 88, 2 (B. C. 427.) The Acharnae was exhibited two years 
afterwards, and during the sixth year of the Peloponnesian war. It 
is therefore the first of his surviving plays ; the Plutus being the last 
which was exhibited Olymp. 98, (B. C. 388.) 



MIDDLE COMEDY. 



Within the period usually assigned to the Middle Comedy, are in- 
cluded the Dramatic writers from Olymp. 101 to Olymp. 111. 

"Towards the end of the Peloponnesian war," says Schlegel, 
"when a few individuals, contrary to the Constitution, had assumed 
the supreme power in Athens, a law was enacted, empowering- every 
person attacked by Comic poets to bring them to justice ; and a pro- 
hibition was issued against the introduction of real persons on the 
stage, or the use of such masks as bore a resemblance to their features, 
&c. This gave rise to what is called the Middle Comedy. Its dis- 
tinctive peculiarities are variously stated: at one time, in the absti- 
nence from personal satire, and the introduction jof real characters ; 
and at another time in the dismissal of the Chorus. v Tfoe introduc- 
tion of real persons under their true names, was at no time an indis- 
pensable requisite. We find characters in many pieces, even of Aris- 
tophanes, in no respect historical, but altogether fictitious, with sig- 
nificant names, in the manner of the New Comedy; and personal 
satire is only occasionally resorted to. The right of personal satire 
was no doubt essential to the Old Comedy ; and by losing this right 
the Comic writers were no longer enabled to throw ridicule on public 
actions and the state. When they confined themselves to private life, 
the Chorus ceased to have any longer a signification. An accidental 
circumstance contributed to accelerate its removal. The dress and 
instruction of the Chorus required a great outlay ; but when Comedy 
came to forfeit its political privileges, and consequently also its festal 
dignity, and was degraded to a mere source of amusement, the poet 
found no longer any rich patrons to defray the expense of the 
Chorus." 

This account of Schlegel will perhaps be deemed very unsatisfac- 
tory ; as it certainly is in a critical point of view, since it does not at- 
tempt to define the precise limits between the Middle and the New 
Comedy. The following extract, therefore, is annexed from the Pre- 
face of that excellent work, the Fasti Hellenici : 

"The new Comedy commenced in the reign of Alexander, and 
this is confirmed by the dates assigned to Philippides and Philemon. 



-32 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

And yet we have Alexis of the Middle Comedy writing for the stage 
thirty years after the first exhibitions of Philippides and Philemon. 
Alexis then, whose works were the standard and example of the Mid' 
die Comedy, was for thirty years contemporary with Philippides, Phi- 
lemon, Menander, and Diphilus, writers of the New Comedy. 

" Neither are the terms middle and new always very carefully ap- 
plied. Aristotle recognises only two species of Comedy, the old and 
the new. Nicostratus, the contemporary of Eubulus and Araros, and 
accounted by some the son of Aristophanes, (which determines his 
age,) is reckoned by Harpocratio among the writers of the New Comedy. 
It is to be noted, however, that although the poets of the Middle 
Comedy are often called of the new, yet the poets of the New Comedy, 
properly so termed, could never be called poets of the Middle Comedy. 
We must, therefore, suppose that Alexis, although a great number of 
his dramas were written long after the New Comedy had arrived at its 
perfection, nevertheless continued to compose upon the model of the 
Middle Comedy." 

Hence it may be seen how difficult it is to define any precise limits 
between these two divisions of Comedy, although ancient critics pretty 
generally admit a distinction between them. The law respecting the 
introduction upon the stage of any character by name, first gave rise 
to the Middle Comedy, and may be regarded as an interval of vacilla- 
tion between the interdiction of the old and the establishment of a 
new comic form. 

Kuster's translation of this law is, neminem expresso nomine loidi. 
In this sense the law is understood, and this seems the opinion gene- 
rally received by critics of its date and meaning. Such an import, 
however, of the law, is by no means warranted by the extant remains 
of the Middle and New Comedy. That law, in the sense of Kuster, 
either never existed at all, or had fallen into disuse in the time of 
AnaxandrideSj who ridicules Plato by name perhaps ten or twelve 
years after the supposed date of this law. (Olymp. 97. B. C. 392.) 
Alexis, at least, paid no attention to it, (if it existed through the 
times of the Middle Comedy,) when he satirized by name the same 
philosopher in four different dramas; nor did Anaxilas regard it, who 
in three Comedies names Plato. But in the time of the Middle 
Comedy, at whose rise democratic^ in oligarchial mutata divites im- 
perare caperunt, the philosophers were ridiculed, and the chief men of 
the state protected:" — the opinion of Jonsius. The former, there- 
fore, were attacked by name, but the poets, after the date of that law, 
abstained from public men. And yet Anaxandrides mentions Poly- 
enctus by name ; Antiphanes names Demosthenes ; and Timocles, in 
a Comedy written towards the end of the reign of Alexander, ridi- 



MIDDLE COMEDY — ARAROS ANAXANDRIDES. 33 

fcules by name five of the leading demagogues at once, in a passage 
which breathes the very spirit of the Old Comedy. The reader who 
opens Athenaeus will see abundant evidence that the poets of the 
Middle and New Comedy laid themselves under little restraint in this 
respect. 

This law, then, when limited to its proper sense, is by no means 
inconsistent with a great degree of Comic liberty, or with those ani- 
madversions upon eminent names with which we find the Comic 
Poets actually to abound. Comedy, therefore, although its form was 
changed, enjoyed the privilege of animadverting still upon public 
events and public men : and we find Isocrates in tins midst of this 
period complaining of the license of Comedy. 

Neither is the date of this law so clear to us. The testimony 
quoted by Petitus ascribes the proposition to one Antimachus. But 
another scholiast ascribes it to one Syracusius, B. C. 415. But as no 
such law could have existed so early, we must suppose the proposi- 
tion of Syracusius, for that time at least, to have failed, and the poets 
to have chastised him for the attempt, although unsuccessful. If the 
account of Platonius is to have any weight, the enactment happened 
during the government of the Thirty : for that is the only period with- 
in these times, to which those descriptions could be applied-— demo- 
cratia in oligarchiam mutata, Sec. — which would bring the date within 
the 94th Olympiad, B. C. 404. 



ARAROS, 

The son of Aristophanes, was a writer of the Middle Comedy, and 
exhibited at the same period as his father. He seems to have been 
but an indifferent poet. 



ANAXANDRIDES, 

Of the Middle Comedy, nourished about Olymp. 101. According 
to Suidas, he laid the foundation for a vicious stage by the introduc- 
tion of subjects revolting to decency. Athenasus relates of him, that 
those Comedies which did not gain the victory, he consigned over as 
waste paper to the perfumers, who had their shops in the forum, dis- 
daining to withdraw and retouch them, as was usual with the other 
poets. 

5 



34 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

ALEXIS, 

Of the Middle Comedy, flourished about Olymp. 106. Suidas says 
he was the uncle of Menander, and composed 245 Comedies. The 
sportive sallies of Alexis obtained for him, with Athenaeus, the title 
of "the graceful" and upwards of 120 of his Comedies are commem- 
orated in that storehouse of lost literature. Alexis was still living in 
the time of Antigonus and Demetrius, Olymp. 118. 



MENANDER, 

A writer of the New Comedy, was born Olymp. 109, 3. He was 
the nephew of Alexis, who instructed him. His father, Diopithes, 
was commander of the Athenian forces on the Hellespont. He died 
Olymp. 122, 1. Menander exhibited his first Comedy Olymp. 114, 
being at that time in his 21st year. According to Suidas he wrote 108 
Comedies, which are all, except one, enumerated by Meursius in Bib- 
liotheca Attica* 



THEATRE. 



The Theatre at Athens was at first a temporary building in the 
Forum, constructed of wooden planks. 

This having given way during the representation of a play of Pra- 
tinus or of iEschylus, a more substantial one, built of stone, was 
erected at the south-east corner of the Acropolis. This Theatre was 
quite open above, and the plays were always represented in open day, 
and beneath the canopy of heaven. When overtaken by a storm or a 
shower, the representation of a piece suffered a temporary suspension, 
the spectators seeking shelter beneath the porticoes of the neighbor- 
ing edifices. The Theatres of the ancients were, in comparison with 
the small scale of ours, of a colossal magnitude, partly for the sake of 
containing the whole of the people, with the concourse of strangers 
who flocked to the festivals ; and partly to correspond with the majesty 
of the dramas represented in them, which required to be seen at a 
respectful distance. 

It appears that the Theatre was filled four times a day, and was ca- 
pable of containing thirty thousand spectators. According to Pollux, 
it was termed indifferently Dionysiacum Theatrum, and Lenaicum. 
The seats of the spectators consisted of steps, which rose backwards 
round the semicircle of the orchestra. The judges appointed by the 
Archon to decide upon the merits of the respective authors, usually 
occupied the first seat. The spectators testified their disapprobation 
by beating the seats with their heels. Women do not appear to have 
been excluded from witnessing the dramatic representations, — an 
opinion confirmed by the well-known story of the Eumenides of 
iEschylus. 

That portion of the Theatre appropriated to the performances was 
divided into, 1. Scena, the whole stage ; %.*Logion, in Latin pulpitum, 
that part where the actors stood ; 3. Orchestra, a semicircular space 
before the Logion, and a little lower than it, on which was the Thy- 
mele, or Altar of Bacchus. 4. Hyposcenium or Conistra, the floor of 
which was on a level with the area of the Theatre, a space decorated 
with columns and statues. The usual place for the persons who 
spoke was in the middle of the Logion, behind which middle part the 
scene went inwards in a quadrangular form, with less depth, how- 



36 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

ever, than breadth. The space here comprehended was called Pro- 
scenium. 

The place beneath the stage, which served perhaps, in some re- 
spects, the purposes of a modern Green-room, was termed Hyposce- 
nium, and that above it-Episcenium. The wings of the scenes were 
Called Paracenia, corresponding perhaps to our Opera term slips. 

The decoration was contrived in such a manner that the principal 
object in front covered the back ground, and the prospects of distance 
were given at the two sides; the very reverse of the mode adopted by 
us. The former was so arranged as to admit of being withdrawn, by 
opening in the middle, and disappearing at both sides ; the latter were 
composed of triangles, which turned on an axis fastened underneath, 
and in this manner a change of scene was effected. 

In the back wall of the scene there was a large main entrance, and 
two side entrances. It has been maintained, that from them it might 
be discovered whether an actor played a principal or under part; as 
in the first case he came in at the main entrance, and in the second 
at the side doors. But this should be understood with the distinction 
that it must have been regulated according to the nature of the piece. 
As the hindmost decoration was generally a palace, in which the prin- 
cipal characters of rOyal descent resided, they naturally came through 
the great door, while the servants resided in the wings. There were 
two other entrances; the one at the end of the Logionjrom whence the 
inhabitants of the town came; the other underneath in the orchestra, 
which was the side for those who had to come from a distance. They 
ascended a staircase of the Logion, opposite to the orchestra, which 
could be applied to all sorts of purposes, according to circumstances. 
The entrance, therefore, with respect to the lateral decorations, de- 
clared the place from whence the players were supposed to come ; 
and it might naturally happen that the principal characters were in a 
situation to avail themselves with propriety of the two last mentioned 
entrances. The situation of these entrances serves to explain many 
passages in the ancient dramas, where the persons standing in the 
middle see some one advancing long before he approaches them. 
Before the principal doorway was an altar, consecrated to Apollo or 
Bacchus, or perhaps to both. 

The particular scenes and machinery employed on the Greek stage 
were numerous and complicated. Beneath the seats of the spectators 
a stair or ladder was somewhere constructed, which was called Cha- 
ronic, and through which the shadows of the dead, without being per- 
ceived by the audience, ascended into the orchestra, and then, by the 
stair before mentioned, made their appearance on the stage. The 
rolling platform for their sea-gods, and a machine of a semicircular 



THEATRE — ACTORS. 37 

form within, and covered above, which being protruded, represented 
the objects contained in it as in a house ; the beacon ; the sky-plat- 
form for the gods ; the crane, by which the actors were borne into the 
air by means of ropes; the artificial thunder and lightning machines ; 
the machine on which the deities descended ; the catahlemata, or a 
sort of embroidered pictures, representing the sea, a river, or some 
other device. 



OF THE ACTORS. 

The actors were termed indifferently hypocrita or agonista. The 
ancient signification of the verb from which the word hypocrita is de- 
rived was to answer; hypocrita, therefore, was the person who answered 
the Chorus ; and as he supported a feigned character, the verb came 
by degrees to signify acting, personating. They might be termed 
agonists from the circumstance of their contending for the prize in 
the tragic contests, as well as the poets. No actresses were admitted 
on the Greek stage. He who performed the principal part was called 
protagonista, the second deuteragonista, and the third tritagonista. 
Pollux says that when a fourth actor did say any thing it was called 
parachoregema, and observes that this occurs in the Agamemnon of 
iEschylus.* They seem to have introduced not only living mutes 
upon the stage, but also figures dressed up to represent men. 



OF THE DRESS AND ORNAMENTS OF THE ACTORS. 

The ancient performers wore masks adapted to their respective 
characters. This, of course, precluded that expression of counte- 
nance to which we are accustomed in our Theatres : but we must re- 



*Neither Tyrwhitt nor the Reviewer has noticed the scene in the Andromache of 
Euripides, (v. 546,) in which Peleus enters and interrupts a conversation between 
Andromache, Molossus, and Menelaus. Here are evidently four actors on the stage 
at the same time, although Molossus does not open his lips after the entrance of 
Peleus ; and it is probable that young children did not fall within the rigor of the 
law. If the reader will forgive us for making a pun, which is suggested to us by 
dire experience, we will venture to compare the rules of the Athenian stage with 
those of the Kensington stage, in which three men, three women, and three chil- 
dren are counted for only six passengers. The Medea and Alcestis of Euripides are 
the only other Greek Tragedies in which children speak.— P. Emsletfs Review of 
Herman's Supplices, v. 350. 



38 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

collect that this expression would have been unobserved in the colos- 
sal Theatres of the ancients. They seem also to have supposed that 
a certain physiognomy was essential to the representation of a certain 
character; the design of the mask was, therefore, in exact conformity 
to the ideal conception of the person to be represented. These masks 
were a species of casque which covered the whole head, representing, 
besides the features of the face, the beard, hair, ears, and ornaments 
appropriate to the character represented. The ancient gloss to one 
of the Greek words rendered by the Latin term personatio, is that the 
word in question is the name for a broad leafy plant, called personata 
by Pliny, who describes it as one cujus folio nullum est latins. In the 
infancy of the theatrical art, such leaves were probably used for masks ; 
which, by gradual improvement, gave rise to the more masterly pro- 
ductions of a later age. These were so contrived as to answer the 
purpose of a speaking trumpet, and to make the actor's voice sonor- 
ous and loud. 

As the features of the player acquired a more decided expression 
from the mask, as his voice was strengthened by a contrivance for that 
purpose, the cothurni, which consisted of several considerable addi- 
tions to his soles, as we may see in the ancient statues of Melpomene, 
raised in like manner his figure considerably above the middle stand- 
ard. What the Comedians wore was called the sock. The invention 
of the buskin is attributed by some to JEschylus, by others to Sopho- 
cles, as Servius relates in his notes on Virgil, Eel. 8, 10. Sola Sopho- 
cleo tua carmina digna cothurno. 

The long vests worn in Tragedy were called JEtolian ; and the 
general style of the Tragic dress was copied from that of the Thessa- 
lians, who, on account of the coldness of their climate, wore longer 
clothes than the rest of the Greeks. For a particular description of 
the vests assigned to various characters, see Pollux, lib. 4, c. 18. It 
will be sufficient to notice in this place that the dresses and attributes 
of the actors were conformable to the characters they represented. 
Thus Kings were dignified with diadems, sceptres, and embroidered 
vests. Heroes were enveloped with skins of lions, tigers, &c, and 
armed with swords, clubs, or spears. In short, the age, sex, and ac- 
tual situation of each actor announced itself by the dress and attri- 
butes assigned him. 



OF THE CHORUS. 

The Chorus, which was originally performed by one person, and 
which was considered as the main business of the representation, by 



THEATRE THE CHORUS. 39 

degrees became subordinate to the acting. But in order to gratify the 
love of spectacle, which distinguished the Athenians, succeeding 
poets increased the number of those who danced and sang; but the 
Chorus was still considered as one actor, and joined in the dialogue 
by means of its head, called Coryphazus. They performed regular 
dances, accommodated, it should seem, to the measure of the verse 
which they sang. They seem to have danced one way while singing 
the strophe, and another during the antistrophe, and to have stood still, 
or to have performed the evolution which dancing-masters call &pous- 
ser, during the epode. But all this is very uncertain. When the 
Tragic Chorus consisted of fifteen, it stood either in three rows of five 
each, or in five rows of three each. But in Comedy, where the Cho- 
rus consisted of twenty-four, they were ranged in rows of four each. 
The dividing of the Chorus into two parts was called dichoria; each 
division hemichorion, and their alternate songs antichoria. Its first en- 
trance upon the stage was called parodus, its temporary retreat from 
the stage metanastasis, and its return epiparodus — its final exit apho- 
dus. The person who assigned to each of the Chorus their proper 
places, was called chorodectes. It appears that the Choryphaei stood 
in the centres of their respective divisions. It appears that the Cho- 
rus entered the orchestra from the right side of the Theatre, and 
danced across it to the left. The less conspicuous situations in the 
Chorus were called hypocolpia. Lines were drawn on the floor of the 
orchestra, along which the ranks were to move. 

The species of dances performed by the Tragic and Comic Cho- 
ruses were called respectively emmeleia and cordax; the kind adapted 
to Satyrs was termed sicinnis. 

With respect to the music of the Chorus, Dr. Bentley says that the 
dialect which it used was Doric, being best adapted to the Doric mood 
in which it sang. The dialect of the Chorus was the remains of its 
original rusticity ; for it appears from Aristotle that the invention of 
Tragedy was claimed by the Dorians. And it is not by any means 
clear that the Chorus always used the Doric mood.. It is more pro- 
bable that they varied the mood according to the subject. Athenasus, 
speaking of the JEolic, Doric, and Ionic moods, says that the last, 
"by reason of its grave, and harsh, and pompous character, is well 
suited to Tragedy." Plutarch, or the author of the treatise de Mu- 
sica, says that " the Mixo-lydian mood is pathetic, and fit for Trage- 
dies ; that the inventress of it was Sappho, from whom the Tragedians 
learned it, and combined it with the Doric ; and further, that it was 
akin to the Ionic mood, which observation illustrates the passage of 
Athenaeus. The reader will bear in mind, that we are all along con- 
sidering the Chorus of Tragedy. 



40 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

The early Tragic poets taught their own Choruses to dance. Athe^ 
naeus tells us that " the ancient poets, Thespis, Pratinus, Careinus r 
and Phrynichus, were called orchestici, because they not only used 
much dancing in the Choruses of their plays, but were themselves 
common dancing-masters, teaching any body that had a mind to learn. 
Again, Chamselion says, that iEschylus was the first person who taught 
his Chorus figure-dances ; not having recourse to professed masters, 
but inventing himself the figures to be danced by them." Afterwards 
there were regular didascali, who undertook for a certain sum to teach 
the Chorus ; and, in some instances, furnished the Chorus for hire. 

The orchestra was semicircular, for which reason it was called in 
later times sigma, from its resemblance to the form of that letter. The 
place where the Chorus was taught was called Chorageion. A stage 
curtain is mentioned both by Greek and Roman writers, and the 
Latin appellatidn aulceum is even borrowed from the Greeks. It was 
not perhaps in use on the Attic stage at its commencement. This 
curtain was not dropped, but drawn upwards ; as appears from Ovid's 
Metamorph. 1. 3. 

Inde, fide majus, glebce coepere moveri, 
Primaque de salcis acies apparuit hastce : 
Tegmina mox capitum picto mutantia cono ' r 

Mox humeri, pectusque 

— Sic ubi tolluntur festis aulcea theatris, 

Surgere signa solent, primumque ostendere vultu^ 



OF THE TRAGIC CONTESTS. 

The dramatic contests always took place at the Dionysia, or festi- 
vals of Bacchus, which were under the immediate superintendence of 
the first Archon, and of which three were holden every year. 

1. The less, or the rural Dionysia, celebrated in the month Po- 
seideon, — the sixth Attic month, answering to the latter part of De- 
cember and the beginning of January. 

% The Lenoza, or those in Limnoz, so called from Limnce, a part of 
the city near the Acropolis, in which was an enclosure sacred to Bac- 
chus, called Lenaium, from lenos, a wine press. In this enclosure 
plays were acted, the audience being placed upon a wooden scaf- 
folding. But afterwards a regular theatre was erected. This festival 
was celebrated in the eighth month, Anthesterion, originally called 



THEATRE — TRAGIC CONTESTS, 41 

lencean, answering to part of February and March.* The festival it» 
self, in later times, went by the name of the Anthesteria, and was holden 
on three consecutive days, the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth of the 
month. The first day's ceremonies were called the broachings ; those 
of the second day, the cups, or drinking bout; those of the third, the 
messes of pottage. 

3. The greater, or civic Dionysia, holden in the ninth month, 
Elaphebolion, answering to part of March and April, and about the 
17th day of the month ; and this festival is always to be understood 
when the words the Dionysia are used by themselves. Dramatic re- 
presentations were introduced at all these festivals, but prizes were 
contended for only in the last two, the Comedians most commonly 
contending at the former, and the Tragedians at the latter. 

The Tragic Contests must always have taken place at the great 
Dionysia, for at that festival the new plays were represented and new 
actors appointed by lot, as appears from several decrees quoted 
iEschines and Demosthenes, and the reason seems to have been this i 
at that festival, strangers from various parts of Greece, and especially 
deputies from all the tributary states of Athens, were present in that 
city ; whereas, at the Lenosa, none but the inhabitants of Attica com- 
posed the audience. 

It appears, then, that although Tragedies were acted on the Lencsari 
festival, the contests of new pieces took place at th© civic Dionysia. 
These were made a national concern ; they «-ere regulated by laws ; 
and the expense of paying and equipping the Choruses was one of 
the state burthens, imposed upon the richer members of the commu- 
nity. This charge was called choragia, and the person who bore it 
choragus. The different choragia, were assigned to the different tribes 
in their turns, and the epimeletce of the tribe fixed them before the 
Dionysia on some wealthy individuals. 

The poets who were desirous of contending for the prize, present*- 
ed their pieces to the first Archon, whose business it was to see that 
the choragi gave their Choruses to none but those who deserved it. 
Casaubon and others tell us, that the phrase to give a Chorus, was 
used of the choragus ; but it rather belonged to the Archon, before 
whom the demand for a Chorus was made, and who was accordingly 
said to give a Chorus when he appointed a choragus to pay the poet's 
expenses. This regulation was made to secure the representation of 
the best pieces. The choragus of a Chorus of boys was obliged by 
law to be above the age of forty years. What age was fixed for the 



* Palmerius and others have confounded the Lenoea with the rural Dionysia, buf 
Buhnkenius has clearly shown that the Lenoea were the same as the Anthesteria. 
6 



42 SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 

other choragi is uncertain. Another law enacted that no foreigner 
should dance in the Choruses, under the penalty of 1000 drachms, 
to be paid by the choragus ; but this referred only to the greater Dio- 
nysia — for, at the Lencean exhibitions it was lawful to introduce for- 
eign dancers. At the latter festival, the metazci also were choragi. 

Sometimes the expenses of the Chorus were voluntarily undertaken 
by some spirited individual, or by the poet himself. Sometimes the 
state was the choragus. The plays of iEschylus were acted a second 
time after his death at the public expense. 

The Archon also, it seems, assigned by lot to the different poets 
three actors apiece ; but the poet who obtained the prize was allowed 
to select his own performers for the next year. 

The contending choragi were called antichoragi ; the poetical or 
musical candidates antididascali ; the actors antitechni. 

The names of successful choragi and poets were proclaimed to the 
people. 

The choragus consecrated to Bacchus a tripod, inscribed with the 
names of himself and his poet and the Archon. But perhaps this is 
true only of the Dithryambic contests. The Tragic victor seems to 
have consecrated a tablet or marble slab. Some think that the actor's 
name was never mentioned in these inscriptions. We certainly do 
not find it in any of the fragments Which remain to us of the Attic 
Didascaliae ; but since the Hypocrita is mentioned in a marble of un* 
certain date and place, in. the Oxford edition, p. 63, and in the Orcho- 
menian inscription, it is probable that in later times the actor's name 
was added to those of the choragus at>d poet. 

The successful poet was honored with a crown of ivy, as were also 
the actors of the successful pieces ; and the pott, with the chorentae, 
sacrificed the epinicia, to which his friends were invited. 

The prizes were awarded by judges appointed by the Archon ; usu- 
ally five in number, but not always. Their decision, as might have 
been expected, was not always impartial. The judges of the Cyclian 
Choruses, as we learn from iEschines, were punishable by fine if they 
decided contrary to justice. 

The tripods and tablets commemorative of the Dionysiac conquer- 
ors were placed in the Lencean temple of Bacchus. From these, 
different authors at various times compiled chronological accounts of 
the dramatic contests, giving the names of the three first competitors, 
the titles of their plays, the success of each, and the name of the Ar- 
Ghon in whose magistracy they were performed. 

There is no mention in the Museum Criticum (from which this ac- 
count is almost entirely taken) of the price paid for admission to the 
Theatres. In the early stage of the art nothing seems to have been 



THEATRE — TRAGIC CONTESTS. 43 

exacted from the spectators ; but such gratuitous admission giving rise 
to many vexatious disputes about places, a law passed fixing the price 
of admission to one drachma each person. This sum was soon, re- 
duced by Pericles to an obolus — evidently for the purpose of- attach- 
ing the poorer people more firmly to his interest ; and he likewise 
procured a law to be enacted by which the magistrates were bound to 
distribute two oboli to each person- — one to defray the expenses of 
admission, and the other to procure him refreshment during the repre- 
sentation. That the spectators were not accustomed to sit fasting, 
but regaled themselves with cakes and nuts and wine during the per- 
formance, ^ve learn from Athenasus, 11, p. 464, f. The fund appro- 
priated for this purpose was termed theorica chremata, and the two 
oboli given to each person, theor\con. 



laru 



DRAMATIC CHRONOLOGY OF 
THE GREEKS. 



B.C. 

535 


ARCHONS. 


POETS. 


m m m ' m 


Thespis first exhibited Tragedy. 


525 


- 


Birth of iEschylus. 


523 


- 


Choerilus first exhibited Tragedy. 


524 


01. 64. Miltiades. 




519 


- 


Birth of Cratinus, the Comic Poet. 


511 


* * - 


Phrynichus, the Tragic Poet, vic- 
torious. 


508 


01. 68. Isagoras. - 


Institution of the chorus of men. 


500 


01. 70. Myrus. - 


Epicharmus perfected Comedy in 
Sicily. 


495 


Philippus. - 


Birth of Sophocles. 


490 


Phoenippus. - $ 


iEschylus present at Marathon, 
set. 35. 


487 


- 


Chionides first exhibits. 


485 


Philocrates. 


Epicharmus continues to write 
Comedy. 


484 


01. 74. Leostratus. 


iEschylus gains the prize in Trag- 
edy. 


480 


01. 75. Calliades. 


Birth of Euripides. 


476 


01. 76. Phcedon. - 


Phrynichus victor in Tragedy. 


472 


01. 77. Chares. - 


iEschylus victor with the tetralo- 






gy — Phineus, Persce, Glaucus 
Potnieus, and Prometheus Sa- 
tyricus. 


468 


01. 78. Theagenides. - 


First Tragic victory of Sophocles. 


458 


Bion. - 


Orestean tetralogy of iEschylus. 


456 


01. 81. Callias. - 


Death of iEschylus. 


455 


Sosistratus. 


Euripides began to exhibit, set. 26. 


450 


Euthydemus. 


Crates, the Comic Poet, and Bac- 




•% 


chylides, flourished. 


447 


Timarchides. 


Achseus and Sophocles exhibit 






Tragedy. 



46 



SYNOPSIS OF THE GREEK DRAMA. 



B. C. 

441 


ARCHONS. 


POETS. 


Timocles. -''-.- 


Euripides gains the prize in Trag- 
edy. 
A decree to prohibit Comedy. 


440 


01. 85. Myrichides. 


443 


Euthymenes. 


The prohibition of Comedy is re- 
pealed in the year of Euthymenes. 


436 


01. 86. Lysimachus. 


Cratinus, the Comic Poet, victor. 


435 


Antolichides. 


Phrynichus, the Comic Poet, first 
exhibited. 


431 


Euthydemus. 


The Medea of Euripides. 


428 


01. 88. Diotimus. 


Hippolytus^of Euripides. 


427 


Euclides. 




426 


Euthydemus. 


Babylonii of Aristophanes. 


425 


Stratocles. 


Acharn. do., in the 6th year of the 
Peloponnesian war. 


424 


01. 89. Isarchus. - 


Equites do. 


423 


Ameinias. - 


1. Nubes do. 


422 


Alcaeus. - 


Vespas and Nubes 2. do. 


421 


Aristion. - - , 


Eupolides exhibits. 


419 


Archias. -.'-'- 


Pax of Aristophanes, in the 13th 
year of the Peloponnesian war. 


416 


01. 91. Arimnestus. 


Agathon gains the Tragic prize. 


415 


Chabrias. - 


Xenocles first with Tetralogy, GE- 

dipus, Lycaon, Bacchae, Atha- 

mas Sat. 
Euripides second with Tetralogy, 

Paris, Palamedes, Trojans, Sisq- 

phus Sat. 


414 


Pisander. - 


Aristoph. Aves. 


412 


01. 92. Callias. - 


Eurip. Andromeda. 


411 


Theopompus. 


Aristoph. Lysistrate & Thesmaph. 


409 


Diocles. - 


Soph. Philoctetes. 


408 


01. 93. Euctemon. 


Eurip. Orestes. 


407 


Antigenes. 


Birth of Antiphanes, the Comic 
Poet. 


406 


Callias. 


Death of Euripides. 


405 


Alexias. 


Death' of Sophocles. 
.Aristoph. Rana?. 


401 


Xensenetus. 


Soph. (Edipus Coloneus exhibited. 


396 


01. 96. Phormion. 


Sophocles, the son of Sophocles, 
began to exhibit. 


392 


01. 97. Philocles. 


Aristoph. Eccles. 


388 


01. 98. Pyrrhion. 


AristopJi. Plutus 2. 


387 


Theodotus. 


Antiphanes began to exhibit. 


376 


01. 101. Charisander. "- 


Anaxandrides, the Comic Poet, 
flourished. 



DRAMATIC CHRONOLOGY OF THE GREEKS. 



47 



B. C. 

375 


ARCHONS. 


POETS. 


Hippodamas. 


Eubulus exhibited Comedy. 






Araros first exhibited. 






The exhibitions of Eubulus, Ara- 






ros, and Anaxandrides, Poets of 






the Middle Comedy, being refer- 






red by the grammarians to the 






101st Olympiad, and those of An- 






tiphanes being after the 98th, we 






may hence infer the period at 






which the Middle Comedy was 






reckoned to commence. 


356 


01. 106. Elpines. 


Alexis, the Comic Poet, flourished 
at this time. 


348 


01. 108. Theophilus. - 


Heraclides, the Comic Poet, flour- 
ished. 


342 


Sosigenes. - 


Birth of Menander. 


335 


Euasnetus. 


Philippides, the Comic Poet, flour- 
ished. 


330 


Aristophon. 


Philemon began to exhibit Come- 
dy, during the reign of Alexan- 
der, a little earlier than Menan- 
der, and before 113th Olympiad. 


324 


01. 114. Hegesias. 


Timocles, the Comic Poet, con- 
tinued to exhibit Comedy after 
this date ; since he ridiculed the 
leading orators for taking bribes 
from Harpalus. 


321 


Archippus. 


Menander's Orge. 

Euseb. 01. 114. 4. Menander pri- 

mam fabulam cognomento Or- 

gen docens superat. 


291 


.... 


Death of Menander, ast. 52. 


289 


- 


Posidippus begins to exhibit. Sui- 
das. 




♦ 


Posidippus Cassandreus, son of 
Cyniscus, a Comic Poet, exhib- 
ited in the third year from the 
death of Menander. 



CONSTRUCTION 

OF 

GREEK DRAMATIC VERSE. 



CONSTRUCTION OF GREEK DRAMATIC VERSE. 



Extract of Elmsley's Review of Porson*s Hecuba. 



Our readers will recollect that the Preface to the Hecuba originally 
appeared in the year J 797; and that the Supplement, the length of 
which is four times that of the original preface, was added in the edi- 
tion of 1802. The principal hero of the piece, although, after the 
example of the heroes of many Tragedies, he is not produced upon 
the Stage until the second act, is the learned Godofred Hermann ; 
whom, for some reason or other, Mr. Porson appears to have consi- 
dered rather as a personal enemy than as a literary antagonist. Almost 
every line of Mr. Porson's Supplement contains an allusion to some 
blunder committed by the above-mentioned learned personage, in one 
or other of the two following works ; Godofredi Hermanni de Metris. 
Euripidis Hecuba. Godofredi Hermanni ad earn et ad R. Porsoni 
Notas Animadversiones. 

Whoever wishes thoroughly to understand the Preface to Mr. Por- 
son's edition of the Hecuba, ought "to devote his days and nights" 
to the study of Mr. Hermann's edition of the same Tragedy. Those 
persons who possess both editions, will do well in binding them in 
one volume ; adding, if they think proper, the Diatribe extemporalis 
of the vehement and injudicious Wakefield, and the excellent stric- 
tures on Mr. Porson's Hecuba and Mr. Wakefield's Diatribe, which 
appeared in the Monthly Review for 1799, and which are well known 
to be written by a gentleman to whom Greek literature is more in- 
debted than to any living scholar. 

The greater part of the original Preface relates to the use of ana- 
pests in tragic senarii. Should any scholar of the nineteenth century 
venture to maintain the admissibility of an anapest, not included in a 
proper name, into any place of a Greek tragic senarius, except the 
first foot, he would assuredly be ranked with those persons, if any 
such persons remain, who deny the motion of the earth, or the circu- 
lation of the blood. Before the appearance of the Preface to the He- 
cuba, critics were divided into two sects upon this subject; the more 
rigid of which excluded anapests from all the even places ; whereas 
the other admitted them promiscuously into any place except the last. 



52 CONSTRUCTION OF 

• 

Mr. Porson (p. 6) with his usual strictness in attributing the merit of 
discoveries and improvements to the right owners, mentions an ob- 
scure hint of the true doctrine, which is contained in the preface to 
Morell's Thesaurus Grcecce Poeseos. By how little effect that hint 
was followed, may be judged from the following words of the learned 
Hermann (Metr. p. 150:) 

" A trisyllabis pedibus Tragici Grseci maxime abstinuerunt, quan- 
quam etiam in pari sede, sed admodum raro, anapestus invenitur. 
Idque et Hephaestio notavit, et nuper Brunckius defendit." 

A Tragic senarius, according to Mr. Porson (p. 20) admits an iam- 
bus into any place ; a tribrach into any place except the sixth ; a 
spondee into the first, third, and fifth ; a dactyl into the first and 
third ; and an anapest into the first alone. So that the first foot of 
the senarius is capable of five different forms ; the third of four ; the 
fifth of three ; the second and fourth of two ; and the sixth of on?y 
one. Two hundred and forty different varieties of the senarius may 
be produced, without employing any combination of feet unauthorized 
by Mr. Porson's rule. The Tragic Poets, however, do not often ad- 
mit more than two trisyllabic feet into the same verse ; and never, if 
our observation be accurate, more than three. The admission of ana- 
pests into the second, third, fourth and fifth places, and of dactyls 
into the fifth place, increases the varieties of the Comic senarius to 
seven hundred and ten. The number would be eleven hundred and 
twenty-five, if four hundred and fifteen combinations were not reject- 
ed, because they exhibit a tribrach or a dactyl immediately before an 
anapest. 

No regular tragic senarius, of whatsoever feet it is composed, can 
possibly exhibit two short syllables enclosed between two long ones, 
or more than three long syllables without the intervention of a short 
one. A moment's consideration will satisfy the reader, that all such 
combinations of syllables are absolutely incompatible with the structure 
of the verse. The inability to employ four or more long syllables to- 
gether, is productive of so little practical inconvenience, that the 
Tragedians appear to have acquiesced in it without difficulty. The 
inadmissibility of two short syllables enclosed between two long ones, 
is a much more serious grievance. Many persons of great eminence 
have had the misfortune to bear name's constituted in that unaccom- 
modating form. Such were Agialeus, iEndromache, Andromeda, An- 

O O ' I.J 

tigone, Antiope, Bellerophontes, Hermione, Hippodamia, Hvpsipyle, 
Iphigenia, Laodamia, Zaomedon, Penelope, Protesilaus, Tiresias, and 
a great many more of equal fame. Although all these persons were 
admirably qualified by their names, as well as by their actions, to 
shine in epic poetry, unhappily not one of them is capable of being 



GREEK DRAMATIC VERSE. 53 

mentioned by name in a Tragic senarius composed in the regular 
manner. There is also another class of persons not altogether so 
unfortunate, whose names are excluded only in some of the oblique 
cases : as Hippolytus, Neoptolemus, CEnomaus, Talthybius, &c. In 
favour of all such persons, and perhaps of the names of places, which 
are formed in the same manner, the Tragic poets occasionally trans- 
gress the ordinary rules of their versification. Proper names, which 
cannot enter the senarius in the regular way, are admitted into it in 
two different manners : the first, of which Mr. Porson has not spoken, 
consists in substituting a chori^mbus in the place of the first dipodia 
of the verse. This practice has been adopted by JEschylus in two 
well-known instances : Theb. 944. Ibid. 553. 

The only other instance of this license, with which we are acquaint- 
ed, is produced from a play of Sophocles by Priscian (p. 1328.) 

The second and more usual way of introducing proper names of 
this form into the verse, consists in admitting the two short syllables, 
and the following long syllable of the proper name, as one foot, into 
the second, third, fourth, or fifth place of the verse. We have not 
observed more than one instance of this practice in the surviving plays 
of JEschylus. 

Sophocles and Euripides, however, will furnish examples in great 
abundance. In the Orestes of Euripides, the name of Hermione 
occurs in a senarius ten times. In nine of these instances, the ana- 
pest occupies the fourth place in the verse. This last circumstance is 
in a great measure the natural consequence of the predilection of the 
Tragic Poets for the penthemimeral caesura. 

We have some doubts whether the Tragedians ever extended this 
license to patronymics. 

A few senarii may be found, which contain anapests in some of the 
four middle places, composed of the first three syllables of a proper 
name. 

As the Tragic trimeter iambic admits anapests when they are con- 
tained in proper names, so it is not unreasonable to suppose, that the 
Tragic tetrameter trochaic admits dactyls in similar circumstances, 
and for the same reason. The thirty-two Tragedies, however, afford 
only two examples of this practice, both of which are probably -corrupt. 

With regard to unnecessary dactyls in this metre, it may be ob- 
served, that they are liable to the same objections as unnecessary ana- 
pests in iambic verses, together with the additional objection that they 
are divided between two words. 

According to Mr. Porson (p. 26.) the Poets of the sock agree with 
their brethren of the buskin, in excluding dactyls from trochaic verses, 
except in case of proper names. In the eleven comedies of Aristo- 



54 CONSTRUCTION OF 

phanes, we have not discovered any genuine instance of a dactyl in a 
verse of this measure. 

We now return to the Tragic senarius, respecting which we find 
two very important canons in the Preface to the Hecuba, besides those 
which relate to the use of anapests. The first of these canons is, that 
the third and fourth feet must not be included in the same word. Hoc 
si fieri posset, says Mr. Porson, omnis rhythmus, omnes numeri fundi- 
tus everterentur. This expression has, in some instances, been con- 
strued rather too strictly, as if it were necessary that a Tragic senarius, 
which has neither the penthemimeral nor the hepthimimeral ccesura, 
should at least have a pause after the third foot. Such verses are in- 
deed sufficiently common ; but a certain number may also be pro- 
duced, which have no regular pause at all in the two middle feet. 

Upon the whole, when we consider how frequently the first and 
second, the second and third, the fourth and fifth, and the fifth and 
sixth feet of the senarius are included in the same word, we cannot 
agree with the learned Hermann (Hec. p. 141) in attributing to chance 
the non-occurrence, or at least the extreme rarity, of verses which 
exhibit the two middle feet similarly conjoined. 

Mr. Porson's second canon may be conveniently expressed in the 
following words : " The fifth syllable of the fifth foot of a Tragic 
tetrameter iambic must be short, if it ends a word of two or more sylla- 
bles, unless the second syllable of the same foot is a monosyllable which 
is incapable of beginning a verse. 

Dissyllables in which the vowel of the second syllable is elided, 
are considered as monosyllables. 

It may not be superfluous to mention, that we have discovered no 
instance of the violation of Mr. Porson's canon in the fragments of 
Simoriides, of Amorgus, and the other early iambic Poets, from whom 
the Tragedians probably derived it. It is also strictly observed in the 
Alexandra of Lycophron. > 

Mr. Porson has omitted to mention, although it appears that he was 
aware of the fact, that his canon is as applicable to those verses, the 
first syllable of the fifth foot of which is a monosyllable which cannot 
begin a verse, as to those in which it terminates a word of two or 
more syllables. The instances to the contrary, which are to be found 
in the thirty-two Tragedies, for the most part admit of very easy and 
satisfactory emendations. 

It may be laid down as a general rule, that the first syllable of the 
fifth foot must be short, if it is followed by the slightest pause or break 
of the sense. 

It appears from what has been said, that the fifth foot of a Tragic 
senarius cannot be a spondee, except in three cases. The first case, 



GREEK DRAMATIC VERSE. 55 

the occurrence of which is by far the most frequent, is when both 
syllables of the fifth foot are contained in the same word. The 
second case is when the first syllable of the fifth foot is a monosylla- 
ble which is not capable of beginning a verse, and which is not dis- 
joined from the following syllable by any pause in the sense. The 
third case is when the second syllable of the fifth foot is a monosyl- 
lable, which, by being incapable of beginning a verse or a sentence, 
is in some measure united to the preceding syllable. The- CEdipus 
Tyrannus of Sophocles contains more than four hundred and twenty 
of the first case, more than fifty of the second, and only one of the 
third. We consider verses to which both the second and third cases 
apply, as belonging to the second. With this reservation, we doubt 
whether the thirty-two Tragedies will afford fifty genuine instances of 
the third case. 

Should the student be desirous of discovering the reasons which in- 
duced the Tragic Poets to observe the rules respecting the fifth foot 
of the senarius, which have been discovered and communicated to the 
world by Mr. Porson, we profess ourselves unable to give him better 
information than that which is delivered by the learned Hermann in 
the following words (Hec. p. 109:) " Caussa autem quare ista voca- 
bularum divisio displicere debet, hcec est. Quoniam in fine cujusque 
versus, ubi, exhaustis jam propemodum pulmonibus, lenior pronunci- 
ations decursus desideratur, asperiora omnia, quo difficilius pronun- 
tiantur, eo magis etiam aures Icedunt: propterea sedulo evitatur ills 
vocabulorum conditio, quae ultimum versus ordinem longiore mora a 
praecedente disjungit, eaque re decursum numerorum impedit ac re- 
tardat." 

To illustrate this doctrine, we may conveniently revert to the first 
ver3e of the Ion. It is by no means necessary to have'enacted the part 
of Mercury in the Ion of Euripides, in order to be sensible of the relief 
which is afforded to the " exhausted lungs" of a corpulent performer 3 
by that variation of the verse in question which we have already pro- 
posed. 

That the Comic Poets were not quite so considerate of the lungs 
of their actors, appears, as well by their neglect of this canon, as by 
the words of inordinate length which they sometimes employ ; par- 
ticularly by one of near eight syllables, which occurs towards the con- 
clusion of the Ecclesiazusae of Aristophanes. Hephsestion informs 
us that the macron, as it was called, of the comic parabasis, 
ought to be pronounced apneusli, without taking breath. In the 
Birds of Aristophanes is the macron of thirteen and a half di- 
meter anapestics (v. 7-23—736,) which contain a hundred and thirty 
four syllables. Upon the whole, it is not without reason that Mr. 



Sgg CONSTRUCTION Gfc 

Hermann (Hec. p. 1,40) exults, in the following terms, over the inap^ 
titude of his rival to investigate the causes of those facts which he had 
sufficient sagacity to discover. " Id sponte animadvertisset vir eru- 
ditissimus, si non satis haberet observare, sed in caussas etiam earum 
rerum quas observavit, inquirendum putaret." 

We are afraid that we shall exhaust the patience of our readers 
although perhaps not their lungs, by the length of our observations on 
the following passage in Mr. Porson's Preface (p. 43:) 

"Nunc iambicorum genus Comicis fere proprium leviter attinga* 
mus, quod vulgo vocatur tetrametrum catalecticum. Duabus rebus a 
Comico senario hoc difFert ; primo, quod quartus pes semper iambus 
aut tribrachys sit oportet ; secundo, quod sextus pes anapaestum etiam 
admittit. Sed pes catalecticam syllabam praseedens non iambus esse 
nequit ; nisi in proprio nomine, ubi conceditur anapaestus. Quod de 
quarto etiam pede intelligi velim." 

We have long suspected that Mr. Porson was mistaken in restrict- 
ing to the case of proper names the use of anapests in the fourth 
place of the cataletic tetrameter iambics of the Comic Poets. The 
appearance of the third edition of the Preface to the Hecuba, with- 
out any modification of the doctrine proposed in the edition of 1802, 
has induced us to examine the question with considerable attention, 
and to present the result of our examinations to our readers. 

We have to observe, in the first place, that all the trisyllabic feet 
which are admissible into comic iambics, are employed with much 
greater moderation in the catalectic tetrameters than in the comic tri- 
meters. The Plutus of Aristophanes, for instance, commences with 
252 trimeters, which are immediately followed by 37 tetrameters; 
after which the measure, though still iambic, becomes antistrophic. 
Nearly three-fifths of the trimeters contain one more trisyllabic feet in 
«ach verse. The 37 tetrameters, on the contrary, exhibit only one 
tribrach and one dactyl, and not one anapest. In the earlier Plays of 
Aristophanes trisyllabic feet are used more unsparingly, both mj.ri- 
meters and in tetrameters. But the comparative rarity of these feet 
in tetrameters is nearly as observable in the Knights, the earliest re- 
maining Play of Aristophanes; which contains a considerable num- 
ber of tetrameters, as in the Plutus, which was written after the versi- 
fication of the comic stage had begun to assume an appearance of 
smoothness and regularity, which the contemporaries of the youth of 
Aristophanes were not desirous of exhibiting. In the second place, 
we must remark, that the eleven surviving Comedies of Aristophanes 
contain more than six hundred tetrameter iambics ; in which number 
of verses, the edition of Brunck exhibits only seventy anapests, which 
the most obstinate critic will venture to defend. 



GREEK DRAMATIC VERSE. 57 

If our seventy anapests were distributed equally among all the 
places of the verse except the seventh, which may be considered as 
out of the question, we should find eleven or twelve instances of an 
anapest in the fourth place. If, upon inspection, we discover only 
three or four such instances, we believe that every person acquainted 
with the nature of chances will allow us to attribute the smallness of 
the number to accident ; unless it can be satisfactorily ascribed to 
some other cause. To exemplify the irregularities which so frequent- 
ly disturb the calculations of the critical arithmetician, it will be suffi- 
cient to mention, that in the Lysistrata, which contains nearly seventy 
tetrameters, Aristophanes has not used a single anapest in a verse of 
that measure ; and that in the Thesmophoriazusae, which Play was 
written nearly at the same time, he has introduced the anapest fifteen 
times in the forty- three tetrameters which the Play contains. 

Before Mr. Porson's edition of the Hecuba appeared, the learned 
Hermann had taught the world, in his incomparable work on Metres, 
(p. 176,) that the fourth foot of a catalectic tetrameter iambic verse 
might be an iambus, a tribrach, an anapest, or a proceleusmatic. 

The fact is, that in this kind of verse the Comic Poets admit ana- 
pests more willingly and frequently into the first, third, and fifth places, 
than into the second, fourth, and sixth. Of the seventy anapests 
which we have observed in the eleven Plays of Aristophanes, twenty- 
two, or nearly one-third, occur in the first place. The first place 
having almost double the number which would accrue to it from an 
equal distribution, some of the other places must necessarily have 
fewer anapests than their fair proportion. 

Aristophanes occasionally introduces a very elegant species of verse 
which we are willing to mention in this place, because it differs from 
the tetrameter iambic, only in having a cretic or pason in the room of 
the third dipodia, and because it is frequently corrupted into a tetra- 
meter iambic by the insertion of a syllable after the first hemistich. 
In technical language it is an asynartete, composed of a dimeter 
iambic and an ithyphallic. It is called Euripideum tesscBreskaideka 
syllaban by Hephaestion (p. 15.) Twenty-five of these verses occur 
together in the Wasps of Aristophanes, beginning with v. 248. 

The measure of these verses resembles the Latin Saturnian, except 
that the first hemistich of the Saturnian is catalectic. 

Dabunt malum Metelli | Naevio poetae. 

Respecting the dimeter iambics of the Comic Poet3, Mr. Porson 
has said nothing ; and we have very little to add to what has been 
said by Mr. Gaisford, p. 224. With the exception of the catalectic 
dipodia] they appear to admit anapests in every place, but more fre- 

B 



5B CONSTRUCTION OF 

quently into the first and third, than into the second and fourth. 
Strictly speaking, indeed, there is no difference in this metre between 
the second and fourth feet, as a system or set of dimeter iambics is 
nothino- more than one long verse divided for convenience of arrange- 
ment into portions, each containing four feet. That the quantity of 
the final syllable of each dimeter is not indifferent, has been remarked 
by Brunck. 

An expression occurs in Mr. Porson's remarks on the trochaic 
metre, which appears to have deceived more than one respectable 
scholar. Mr. Porson observes (p. 46) that the catalectic tetrameter 
trochaic of the Tragic and Comic Poets may conveniently be con- 
sidered as consisting of a cretic or pseon prefixed to a common tri- 
meter iambic. 

Mr. Porson adds : 

"Sed in hoc trochaico senario (liceat ita loqui) duo observanda 
sunt ; nusquam anapaestum, ne in primo quidem loco, admitti ; deinde 
necessario semper requiri caisuram penthemimerim." 

The inadmissibility of anapests into the trochaic senarius may be 
exemplified by prefixing a cretic to the fifth verse of the Plutus of 
Aristophanes. 

The dactyl in the second place vitiates the metre of this verse, con- 
sidered as a tetrameter trochaic. Common readers will pardon us for 
explaining this passage in Mr. Porson's preface, when we show that 
it seems to have been misunderstood by so excellent a scholar as Mr. 
Burgess. In Mr. Porson's edition of the Phaenissas, v. 616, he has 
an anapest in the fourth place. In his note upon this verse, Mr. Bur- 
gess remarks, Raro et fortasse nunquam in Irochaicis Tragicis ana- 
pcBstus occurrit. And he proposes to emend it accordingly. It is 
somewhat remarkable, that an anapest in verse 621 of the same play 
has escaped Mr. Burgess's observation. 

In Mr. Porson's edition of the Orestes, anapests occur in the five 
following trochaics, vss. 728, 776, 787, 1528, 1530. The Iphigenia 
in Aulis will supply near twenty examples, including a few in which 
the anapest is included in a proper name. 

It is almost unnecessary to mention that, in this metre, anapests are 
admissible only into the even places. It may, however, be not alto- 
gether superfluous to observe, that the Tragic Poets appear to have 
used anapests in the even places as willingly and frequently as tri- 
brachs in any place, except the first and fifth. The thirty-two Trage- 
dies exhibit about thirty-two instances of a tribrach in the second, 
third, fourth, sixth, or seventh place, several of which appear to be 
corrupt. 



GREEK DRAMATIC VERSE. 59 

Both in Tragedy and in Comedy, the tetrameter trochaic is usually 
divided into two hemistichs by a ccesura after the fourth foot. The 
Tragedians, however, observe this rule much more strictly than the 
Comedians. Most of the instances to the contrary have been cor- 
rected in a satisfactory manner. 

Mr. Porson remarks (p. 50,) that in dimeter anapestics a dactyl is 
very seldom, rarissime, placed immediately before an anapest, so as 
to cause a concourse of four short syllables. Mr. Gaisford (p. 279) 
has collected several instances of this concourse, and some additional 
examples have occurred to us, while more may probably be detected 
by diligent search ; but those produced are sufficient to prove that 
Mr. Porson's expression must be construed with some degree of lati- 
tude. According to Mr. Porson (p. 55) there is no genuine instance 
of this license in tetrameter anapestics. 

The anapestic dipodia may be composed of a tribrach and an ana- 
pest, for the purpose of admitting a proper name, which cannot other- 
wise be introduced into the verse. 

In both kinds of anapestic verse, dactyls are admitted with much 
greater moderation into the second than into the first place of the 
dipodia. The eleven Comedies of Aristophanes contain more than 
twelve hundred tetrameter anapestics, in which number we have re- 
marked only the nineteen following examples of a dactyl in an even 
place, which, in this kind of anapestic metre, can only be the second 
foot of the verse, as Mr. Porson has observed (p. 51.) 
Eq. 524,* 805, 1327. 
Nub. 351,* 353, 409.* 
Vesp. 389, 551, 671, 673,* 708,* 1027. 
Pac. 732. 
Lys. 500. 
Thesm. 790, 794. 
Ran. 1055. 
Eccl. 676.* 

In all these verses, except those six which are marked with an as- 
terisk, the preceding foot is also a dactyl. 

The same observations apply in a certain degree also to dimeter 
anapestics. 

Trifling alterations require no authority to support them ; but we 
would not go so far as to change the order of the words for the pur- 
pose of removing a dactyl out of an even place. 

Of the nineteen tetrameters mentioned in the preceding paragraph, 
only one is destitute of a cczsura after the first dipodia. Nub. 353. 

Similar instances are exceedingly rare in dimeters. Mr. Gaisford 
has collected more than fifty instances of the violation of the ccesura 



60 CONSTRUCTION OF, &C. 

in dimeter anapestics, in six of which, the foot which ought to be fol- 
lowed by the ccesura is a dactyl. 

Every person who has a tolerable ear, and is acquainted with the 
subject, will immediately perceive that the rhythm of the following 
verses is not quite perfect : 

.aEsch. Prom. 1067. 

Choeph. 1068. 

Soph. (Ed. Col. 1754. 

Eur. Med. 160. 
lb. 1408. 

Suppl. 980. 

Iph. Aul. 28. 
The rhythm of the first hemistich of the first, second, fourth, fifth, 
and seventh of these verses, and o.f the second hemistich of the third 
and sixth, is rather dactylic than anapestic. The same effect is always 
produced when the last three syllables of a word, which are incapable 
of standing in the verse as an anapest, are divided, as in the preceding 
examples, between a dactyl and the following foot. In Comic ana- 
pests, such faults may generally be corrected with great ease. 

We shall now take our leave for the present of this great Critic, who 
in the compass of a few pages, has thrown more light upon the sub- 
jects of his inquiry, than can be collected from all the numerous 
volumes of his predecessors. For ourselves, we have only to express 
a hope, that our strictures may contribute in some degree to the in- 
formation of such younger students in Greek literature as are disposed 
to peruse the Preface to the Hecuba with that care and attention 
which it so eminently deserves, and without which its merits cannot 
be duly appreciated. 



A SKETCH OF THE PRINCIPAL USAGES 

OF THE 

MIDDLE VOICE OF THE GREEK VERB 

When its signification is strictly observed. 



Qui bene dividif, bene doeet. 



The first four may be called usages of reflexive ; the fifth the usage' 
of reciprocal signification. 

1. Where A does the act on himself or on what belongs to himself, 
t. e. is the object of his own action. 

2. Where A does the act on some other object, M, relatively to 
himself (in the sense of the dative case put acquisitively) and not for 
another person, B. 

3. Where A gets an action done for himself, or for those belonging 
to him, by B. 

Thus, of Chryses it is said (see the original) he came to get his? 
daughter released by Agamemnon, on the payment ef a ransom, that is ? 
briefly, to ransom his daughter. 

Whereas of Agamemnon it is said (see the original) he did nofc 
grant the release, he did not release her. 

4. Where the direct action is done by A on himself; but an accu- 
sative or other case follows of B, whom that action farther regards. 

See Iliad. 3. 25. 

Although fleet dogs stir themselves in pursuit of him. 

Again, II. 24.— 710. 

Tore their hair in mourning over him. 

And so, too, the following: (see the original.) 

Hector stretched out his arms to receive his son. 

Thus far the reflexive uses : now the reciprocal use. 

5. Where the action is reciprocal betwixt two persons or parties, 
and A does to B what B does to A ; as in verbs of contract, quarrel, 
war, reconciliation, and the like : — 

Thus, Demosth. Philip. A, § 6.— (See the original.) 



(52 A SKETCH OF, &C. 

Till we shall have put an end to the war in which we are engaged 
with Philip, by treaty mutually agreed upon. 

In a very different sense, as follows, is the active verb used : (see 
the original.) 

Thucyd. 8. § 46. 

To be in no hurry to put an end to the war between the two conflicting 
parties in Greece. 

Remark. — Though on some occasions the active voice is used where 
the middle would be proper, that is, where the act is denoted without 
relation to the agent, though there does exist a middle verb so to de- 
note it, yet where the two voices exist in actual use, the middle de- 
noting the action relatively to the agent, as in No. % is very seldom, 
if ever, in pure Attic, used to denote the action when it regards an- 
other person. 



a)aoo(DurffiQa <2>sr i?®^^iBir 9 



INTENDED TO 



AID THE JUDGMENT OF YOUTH 



IN REGARD TO THE 



POETICAL LITERATURE OF AMERICA AND G. BRITAIN 



INCIDENTALLY OF OTHER COUNTRIES ALSO. 



O ! deem not in this world of strife 
An idle art the poet brings ; 

Let high philosophy control, 
And sages calm the stream of life ;-- 
'Tis he refines its fountain springs, 
The nobler passions of the soul. 

Campbell. 



BY GEORGE PADDISON. 



WINCHESTER '. 

I&JUMTJBD BY WILLIAM TOWERS. 
1SS8. 



NOTICE. 



In extenuation of faultiness in the following pages I have to state, 
briefly, that different accidents of time and place quite hindered me 
from making reference to books for passages of illustration. I quote 
from memory invariably, the sentences from Cicero and ,( The Citi- 
zen of the World " excepted. In most cases I have not seen the 
original for some years past : verbal inaccuracies, therefore, may oc- 
cur ; and for such, where found, I ask indulgence. The sentiments 
of any author here quoted will, I think, always be found unaltered. — 
For brevity I make no apology, being of opinion that where so much 
room is allowed for pompous parade of words, conciseness, if intelli- 
gible, is a decided recommendation. My design will be fully accom- 
plished if the "Discourse" be considered in some measure didactic. 

George Paddisqn* 

Burlington, Hampshire Co., Va. > 
February, 1838. \ 



PAS. T X 



PRELIMINARY 



If the pretensions of the following treatise be estimated according 
to the exalted nature of the subject discussed, they will be found of 
an humble order indeed, and will certainly fall much below general 
expectation. Nor, I fear, will the manner in which these very mode- 
rate pretensions are set forth, adequately compensate for their intrin- 
sic deficiency. " How, then," exclaims some patron among the pub- 
lic, "am I to be wholly disappointed?" My friend, I trust not: a 
few particulars must be stated, which, taken in connection with the 
"Discourse," may lead to a right understanding of the whole matter., 
and bespeak your forbearance on those points wherein I appear to fail 
in answering your reasonable anticipation. 

An Englishman by birth, I emigrated at an age when the literature 
of my country, if cultivated at all, cannot but have stamped deep and 
indelible impressions on the heart and mind. No one will deny that 
the last half century has been an era remarkably rife with the produc- 
tions of genius, and that genius of the very highest order : hence it 
followed, that the periods of boyhood and youth in Britain, during the 
time alluded to, were singularly brightened by coruscations of intel- 
lect rarely intermitting, sometimes dazzling, but always striking. Ani- 
mated with a lively interest — I might almost call it personal — in the 
career and rivalry of wit, students of every grade emulously thronged 
round the arena of competition ; the spirit of an author was caught 
up, fresh and vigorous, from the store-house of invention ; and his 
efforts to succeed sustained with undiminished energy by the con- 
sciousness of public and scrutinizing observation. From this pro- 
ceeded a result doubly beneficial : while the living were admired, the 
dead, in a manner, lived again. With the applause bestowed on the 
former, there was induced a more earnest mood of attention to the 
merits of the latter — merits, till then, too often dormant, or merely 
accredited on the faith and reverence awarded to antiquity. This 
effect had, indeed, the happiest result, in its way ; for thus were many 



g A DISCOURSE ON. POETRY. 

established errors of opinion exploded, and even-handed justice ad- 
ministered to the claims of writers (I confine my observations to poet- 
cal writers) belonging to the old and middle, as well as to the new, 
ages of composition. 

Such a result, to be sure, could never have been attained, had not 
calmness, urbanity, and liberality of sentiment, uniformly marked the 
conduct of those inquiries and controversies thence ensuing — charac- 
teristics of discussion still the more remarkable and honorable, inas- 
much as the literary name and fame of individuals so engaged, did, in 
several instances, greatly depend on the issue : witness the Byronian 
controversy with Bowles on the writings and character of Pope. 

With all this passing in actual review before their eyes, no wonder 
that the youth of Great Britain feel considerable excitement, and have 
had their sympathies effectually awakened in behalf of the poetical 
literature of their language. 

From a particular motive I adopt this phrase — "the poetical litera- 
ture of their language," in preference to that which more readily sug- 
gests itself, the poetical literature of their country. In explaining this 
motive, I may, perhaps, give umbrage where I do but intend monition : 
the candid, however, will not subject my remarks to misconstruction. 
Indeed, what I say may not be very generally applicable : I would 
cheerfully acquiesce in the belief that it is not so, because my resi- 
dence in the Union has not been long, nor have I enjoyed opportuni- 
ties of extended observation : nevertheless, whilst here, I have been 
almost exclusively engaged amongst the young, and can truly affirm 
that I have found the majority of them little observant of the works of 
American writers, whose names, talents, and literary standing, are, to 
British youth, " familiar as household words." 

This ought not to be : I will express myself without reserve. It 
betrays a deplorable, a reproachful apathy towards a cause, which, in 
other countries, enlists on its side the warmest, die most generous, 
and, I will add, the most patriotic feelings of those whose hearts are 
buoyant in the flush and prime of ripening manhood. . 

Here, in these United States, no pains are spared, as the faculties 
of the mind expand, to instil the rudiments and broader principles of 
political freedom. This is right — this is noble : it argues a nation 
justly proud of its rights, and jealous of their perpetuity. May the 
fostering spirit of civil and religious liberty never be quenched ! Prac- 
tical men, I am aware, object to poetry on the ground of its inutility; 
but wrong-headed politicians and imperfect utilitarians are they, who 
denounce the cultivation of Taste, and a relish for the elegancies of 
literature, as incompatible with the scientific operations, the interests 
and duties of the ordinary avocations of life. 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRiT. / 

If poetry is really " an idle art," then, indeed, are poets the very 
lords of laziness, and, as such, a nuisance and a pest to the common- 
wealth. But the history of poetry and of the world, — for the world 
and poetry are almost coeval, — directly disproves the assumption. 
An "idle art" indeed! It is unnecessary to multiply examples ; I 
am, besides, neither inclined nor prepared to try conclusions in detail 
and at length, just now : two or three instances will serve as cases in 
point. 

Were the military talents and experience of iEschylus less service- 
able to his country, when invaded by the Persians, because of his 
ability to celebrate, in the very loftiest strains of poetry, that victory 
which his exploits, as a soldier and a general, had so eminently con- 
tributed to achieve ? 

Were the charms of melody and metre no practical advantage to 
those captive Athenians, who, chaunting the verses of their country- 
man, Euripides, as a solace to the thraldom of their bonds, thus con- 
ciliated the victor's clemency, won over the better feelings of human- 
ity to their behalf, and gained redemption ? 

Lacedaemonian citizens trembled for their liberties, already more 
than half extinguished by the dominant power of a neighboring re- 
public, when suddenly the poet Tyrtasus, all crippled in person and 
derided as he was, uttered those inspiring notes of elegy, which, " like 
some sweet clarion's breath," with the music and the melody of num- 
bers, roused his associates to the rescue, and saved the common- 
wealth. Was poetry an "idle art" then? 

But to come more closely to our own times, and to persons and 
characters with whom all are, more or less, conversant. 

Was Milton, on account of his deep devotion to the Nine, less for- 
cible in argument as the polemical antagonist of Salmasius ? 

Is the peasant of Scotland, in our own times, less industrious, less 
frugal, — his wife less thrifty, less notable, — because the poems of Burns 
have a constant place on the mantle in their humble dwelling, and 
that place th° next to his Bible ? 

Was the lata and lamented George Crabbe less zealous, less effi- 
cient, as a minuter of the gospel, because he wrote poetical " Tales 
of the Hall " ? — hies equally captivating and instructive, whether read 
in the hall or the cottage. 

Does the biography of the poets Hogg, Bloomfield, or Clare, ar- 
raign them for incapacity, or inefficiency in their respective callings, 
mechanical or agricultural r 

My friend, no : the reverse of all this is the fact— and a fact it is, 
undeniable, of easy proof, and well deserving an attentive considera- 
tion. A poet is useful to the commonwealth. Why, then, it may be 



3 A DISCOURSE ON fcOETRY. 

asked, does Plato, in organizing his theoretical Republic, dismiss 
Homer himself, even wearing a garland and anointed ? It was be- 
cause poetry then constituted the principal vehicle, the grand conser- 
vatory, of those absurdities connected with the system of Pagan my- 
thology. That system Plato, together with the other real philosophers 
of Greece, whose conceptions of the Deity more nearly approached 
decorum and truth, despised and ridiculed. While, therefore, the 
ointment and the garland betoken, the philosophical legislator's admi- 
ration and regard, the dismission of the poet is exacted, that he should 
not counteract the salutary tendency of the Platonic discipline in re- 
gard to religion, nor " destroy the right notion of God with his fa- 
bles."* 

Such a dread is a confession, at once, of the mighty power ascri- 
bed to poetry ; whether for good or whether for ill, necessarily depends 
on the direction which it receives. 

But, returning to the position that a poet is useful to the common- 
wealth, I shall spare myself farther trouble in the demonstration by 
referring to Cicero's eloquent pleading for his client, the poet Archias, 
passim, but in particular to the second division of the confirmatory 
arguments for the defence, a slight summary of which may, perhaps, 
prove interesting. 

At the suit of one Gracchus, this Archias, by birth a stranger, stood 
on his trial, charged with having illegally exercised the rights and 
privileges of a Roman citizen. He was warmly defended by Cicero, 
between whom and the accused there appears to have long existed a 
most friendly correspondence. After confuting the prosecutor's evi- 
dence touching the several points of law involved in the case, the 
orator proceeds farther to establish the validity of his client's claim to 
the immunities of citizenship by various ingenious arguments, the 
most remarkable of which are the following : — 

That, on the principle of gratitude, private affection was due to a 
man like Archias, who, by the effusions of his genius, lightened the 
labor, diversified the monotony, and augmented the resources of the 
legal profession ; 

That, to poets in general public gratitude Was likewise due, for the 



Quaeres a nobis, Gracche, cur tantopere hoc nomine delectemur? 
quia suppeditat nobis, ubi et animus ex hoc forensi strepitu reficiatur, 
et aures co: vicio defessas conquiescant. Antu existimas, aut suppe- 
tere nobis posse, quod quotidie dicamus in fanta varietate rerum, nisi 



* Vide Joscphus, against Apion, Book 2d, paragraph 37. 



Q 

A DISCOURSB ON POETRY. * 

many noble patterns of human excellence struck off and preserved 
in their writings, to the advantage of all posterity ; 

That such would still be the case, even though, setting aside the 
consideration of moral improvement, mental recreation were the sole 
benefit derivable from the study of the poets ; 

That the gift of poetry is, in a manner, the peculiar grace of Hea- 
ven ; 

That the Muses have ever been welcomed, by the virtuous and the 



animos nostros doctrina excolamus : aut ferre animos tantam posse 
contentionem, nisi eos doctrina eadem relaxemus? 

Sed pleni omnes sunt libri, plenae'sapientum voces, plena exemplo- 
rum vetustas : quae jacerent in tenebris omnia, nisi literarum lumen 
accederet. Quam multas nobis imagines, non solum ad intuendum, 
verum etiam ad imitandum, fortissimorum virorum expressas, scrip- 
tores et Graeci et Latini reliquerunt ! 

####*# T> '^i' # * # 

Quod si non hie tantus fructus ostenderetur, si ex his studiis delec- 
tatio sola peteretur : tamen ut opinor, hanc animi remissionem hu- 
manissimam ae liberalissimam judicaretis. Nam caetera neque tempo- 
rum sunt, neque a3tatum omnium, neque locorum : at hasc studia ado- 
lescentiam alunt, senectutum oblectant, secundas res ornant, adversis 
perfugium ac solatium prasbent ; delectant domi, non impediunt foris ; 
pernoctant nobiscum, peregrinantur, rusticantur. Quod si ipsi haec 
neque attingere, neque sensu nostro gustare possemus, tamen ea mi- 
rari deberemus, etiam cum in aliis videremus. 
* # # # # # #* # 

Hunc ego non diligam ? non admirer? non omni ratione defenden- 
dum putem ? Atque sic a summis hominibus eruditissimisque accepi- 
mus, caeterarum rerum studia et doctrina, et praeceptis, et arte con- 
stare ; poetam natura ipsa valere, et mentis viribus excitari, et quas 
divino quodam spiritu inflari. Quare suo jure noster ille Ennius sanc- 
tos appellat poetas, quod quasi deorum aliquo dono atque munere 
commendati nobis esse videantur. Sit igitur, Judices, sanctum apud 
vos, humanissimos homines, hoc poetae nomen, quod nulla unquam 
barbaria violavit. Saxa et solitudines voce respondent, bestiae atque 
immanes cantu flectuntur, atque consistunt : nos instituti rebus opti- 
mis non poetarum voce moveamur ? 

Neque enim quisquam est tarn aversus a Musis, qui non manda 
versibus aeternum suorum laborum facile praaconium patiatur, 



10 A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 

brave, as the sacred heralds of fame ; the inviolable guardians unto 
whose trust the future renown of their exploits is consigned ; in proof 
whereof witness the conduct of Themistocles 3 of Lucullus, of Ma- 
rius, of Sylla, of Scipio Africanus, of Alexander, of Pompey the 
Great, of Decimus Brutus, of Fulvius ; 

That, in the human heart the desire of distinction is innate ; 

That, to the celebrity of an individual, the credit of the community 
at large, of which he is a member, is very closely allied ; 



Ac iis laudibus certe non solum ipsi, qui laudantur, sed etiam pop- 
uli Romani nomen ornatur. In ccelum hujus proavus Cato tollitur : 
magnus honos populi Rom. rebus adjungitur. 

# # # * # % # # # 

*Q,uam multos scriptores rerum suarum magnus ille Alexander se- 
cum habuisse dicitur? Atque is tamen cum in Sigco ad Achillis tu- 
mulum adstitisset, fortunate, inquit, adolescens, qui tuae virtutis Ho- 
merum prseconem inveneris ! Et vere ; nam nisi Ilias ilia extitisset, 
idem tumulus, qui corpus ejus contexerat, nomen etiam obruisset. 

Neque enim est hoc dissimulandum, quod obscurari non potest ; 
sed praj nobis ferendum : trahimur omnes laudis studio, et optimus 
quisque maxime gloria ducitur. Illi ipsi Philosophi, etiam in illis li- 
bellis, quos de contemnenda gloria scribunt, notnen suum inscribunt: 
in eo ipso, in quo praedicationem nobilitatemque despiciunt, praedicari 
se ac nominari volunt. 

# # * ' # # # * * * 

Quare in qua urbe imperatores prope armati poetarum nomen et 

Musarem delubra coluerunt, in ea non debent togati Judices a Musa- 

rum honore, et a poetarum salute abhorrere. 

Nunc insidet quaedam in optimo quoque virtus, quae noctes et dies 
animum gloriae stimulis concitat, atque admonet, non cum vitas tem- 
pore esse dimittendam commemorationem nominis nostri, sed cum 
omni posteritate adaequandam. An vero tarn parvi animi videamur 
esse omnes, qui in repub. atque in his vitas periculis laboribusque ver- 



* Gratus Alexandro regi magnofuit ille 
Chcerilus, insulsis qui versibus et male natis 
Rettulit acceptos, regale nnmisma, Philippos. 

Horace. 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 11 

And that, therefore, reverting to the principle of gratitude, even 
had the attempt to establish those legal points of the question now at 
issue failed, yet were the Roman people unequivocally bound to re- 
ceive such a poet as Archias with opeu arms, and on the equal foot- 
ing of a Roman citizen ; for this would only be a proper tribute of 
respect to a man, who, by his excellent abilities and poetical endow- 
ment, had done'so much to extol the Roman name. 

In addition, I will second the above by an opinion delivered as from 
the pen of " The Citizen of the World :" 

"As every country grows more polite, the press becomes more useful ; 
and writers become more necessary as readers are supposed to increase. 
In a polished society, that man, though in rags, who has the power of 
enforcing virtue from the press, is of more real use than forty stupid 
brachmans, or bonzes, or guebres, though they preached never so of- 
ten, never so loud, and never so long. That man, although in rags, 
who is capable of deceiving even indolence into wisdom, and who 
professes amusement, while he aims at reformation, is more useful in 
refined society, than twenty cardinals with all their scarlet, and trick- 
ed out in all the fopperies of scholastic finery." 



samur, ut, cum, usque ad extremum spatium, nullum tranquillum at- 
que otiosum spiritum duxerimus, nobiscum sitnul morilura omnia ar- 
bitremur ? An cum statuas et imagines, non animorum simulacra, sed 
corporum, studiose multi surnmi homines reliquerint, consiliorum re- 
linquere ac virtutum nostrarum effigiem nonne multo malle debemus, 
summis ingeniis expressam et politam?* 

Quae cum ita sint, petimus a vobis, Judices, si qua non modo hu- 
mana, verum etiam divina in tantis negotiis commendatio debet esse; 
ut eum, qui vos, qui vestros imperatores, qui populi Romani res ges- 
tas semper ornavit, ********* 
quique est eo numero, qui semper spud omnes sancti sunt habiti at- 
que dicti, sic in vestram accipiatis fidem, ut humanitate vestra levatus 
potius, quam acerbitate violatus esse videatur.* 



* With the whole of this remarkably fine and philosophical passage compare Mil- 
ton's Lycidas, particularly the part which concludes the " Discourse ;" compare 
also, Hamlet's soliloquy. 

* Mark the secure and lofty tone of this final appeal to the judges for a verdict in 
favor of the accused. 



]3 A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 

But it may be objected that what is here cited does not directly bear 
on the subject of Poetry. This is literally true : the application of 
the sentiments, especially of those conveyed in the English citation, 
to poetical composition is inferential, I admit; but I esteem it no less 
authoritative, on that account. The republic of letters, like this po- 
litical republic of the Union, is of wide compass, embracing within 
its range many and various departments, the individual interests and 
amelioration of which can only be successfully promoted by a happy 
amalgamation of those properties constituting the peculiar elements 
of each. In realizing such a combination of resources, the poet has 
always stood in advance, prominent and conspicuous. 

With what institution, human or divine, has not poetry associated 
itself, and proved a powerful ally ? The field, the forum, and the pul- 
pit, have, simultaneously or by turns, participated in its untiring co- 
operation. 

Was it the mere wantonness of convivial humor, the petulant indul- 
gence in holiday pastime, which, at stated intervals of time, sumraoiw 
ed the valor and the wisdom of ancient Greece to witness the poeti- 
cal digladiation of her chosen spirits at Olympia? Oh, no! an im- 
pulse far different and more resistless swayed the feelings and princi- 
ples of that august assemblage of heroes, sages, and potentates of the 
earth. That solemnity was a wondrous concentration of mind — an 
unparalleled display of whatever is commanding in man — the perfec- 
tion of moral, rational, and physical energy: and there it was that 
poetry might, and did, vindicate its native glory, pre-eminent, unsul- 
lied, una^enchable. For there, when power swelled with the intole- 
rable taint of corruption, and private virtue failed beneath the contam- 
ination ; when laws were a mockery, conscience but a scoff; — then 
and there would the Muse raise a voice pitying or reproachful, but al- 
ways free, always dauntless. Nor was the call unheard : whether by 
pity or reproach, men's hearts were tried and shaken ; tyranny shrunk, 
dismayed ; the patriot blushed; and honor, for awhile, at least, grew 
regenerate and reclaimed. 

Such was the spell of Poetry among a refined but dissolute people. 
The ample page of history will unfold many such. Memorable in- 
stance ! how worthy of all preservation ! Never let it be veiled from 
the stedfast regard of the rising generation. In a great and growing 
republic like this, the attention of youth should, in an especial man- 
ner, be directed to such contemplation. This can only be done by 
placing before them the finest models of composition : care must be 
taken that they be the finest, for by such alone have all extraordinary 
movements of moral impulse been accomplished. The ''heaven of 
invention" may be overshadowed, and the gloom is dangerous. Alex- 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 13 

ander of Macedon had so long slept with a copy of his favorite Ho-* 
raer under his pillow, that, when starting on a military expedition, he 
pre-engaged the abilities of a scribe, who accompanied him, in order, 
no doubt, to eternize his exploits in deathless song, and thus to take 
fame by the forelock. The scribe, however, was but a scribe, and no 
poet. The coinage of his hireling brains bore not the sterling stamp 
of ethereal origin ; and, had the conqueror's renown rested solely on 
that fallacious passport, the fame or infamy of Alexander would hard- 
ly have reached posterity — would hardly, indeed, have survived his 
own fatal excesses. 

Nevertheless, the fact still adds weight on the side of poetical in- 
fluence. Into designs of purest and soundest, yet merely human, 
conception, something base and spurious will, nay must, intrude. — 
Nor, again, is it allowable to identify the poet with the man. — Horace 
threw away his shield and fled, at Philippi. Did not the conduct of 
Demosthenes, in the critical moment of personal danger, evince his 
stronger "appetite for words than war?" If, notwithstanding, the 
cause of eloquence have suffered no detraction by the dereliction of 
the orator, neither should desertion of duty in the poet tend to im- 
pair one tone from the strings of the Roman lyre. Prior and Addi- 
son were both good poets — both amiable men; as statesmen, they 
were either unsuccessful or undistinguished. What, then ? Shall 
poetry be therefore despised ? It ought not to be, surely. The co- 
incidence only shows that talents for writing, and talents for mana- 
ging state-business or state-intrigue, are not inseparable. Is the con- 
verse of this demonstrable ? Does the absence of all talent for com- 
position infallibly denote the existence of all other kinds of talent? 
Let any man's experience give the reply. In these and similar cases 
the Virgilian aphorism, "non omnia possumus omnes" should be adopt- 
ed as a motto of fair and honorable compromise. 

But, for the purpose of stimulating a laudable curiosity, a befitting 
spirit of inquiry on this most interesting topic, it is not necessary to 
refer the youth of America to the relics of those dispersed and dis- 
tant bursts of minstrelsy, which wrought their enchantment in 
the olden times — the times of Greek and Roman glory. Here, in 
their own language, and at home, are the materials abundant. Let 
them ponder over the writings of those among their countrymen who 
are deservedly numbered with the poets of the age : let them also 
turn an unprejudiced eye on the poetical authorship of Great Britain. 
This they may do with confiding willingness. Be Britain what she 
may in other respects, in Letters she is staunchly, sternly republican : 
in politics or laws she may, perhaps, mislead ; but in literature she 
demands vour trust. There the Parnassian laurel will often bloom 



14 A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 

with perennial freshness on the brows of a peasant, while it withers 
in contact with the coronet of a peer ; and well have American son* 
of genius profited by a knowledge of the fact. 

Moreover, it should be steadily remembered, that in all operations 
pertaining to the exercise of the mental faculties, no one ought to re- 
press a rising hope or desire of improving them, from a consciousness 
of their backward condition, imputable to early dislike, or inveterate 
neglect. An acquired taste may become more permanent than a na- 
tural one; and from habit, true relish may insensibly spring. The 
elder Cato, late in life, studied the Greek language with success; so 
did the modern Italian dramatist, Alfieri ; and with parallel success 
may the efforts of any otie be crowned, who brings to the study se- 
lected those best and most cheering attendants on application, an 
anxious heart and a ready mind. 

Let, then, I repeat, the youth of this country, in an earnest, unsus- 
pecting frame of mind, approach the classic streams of British poetry, 
dreading no alloy to their patriotism. A high authority in the land 
has recently reminded them how their forefathers nerved themselves 
to renounce the boast of being the countrymen of Shakspeare and 
Milton.* Youth of America, rest assured, that if the import was mo- 
mentous, the sacrifice was not light. 



*Vide peroration of John Quincy Adams's Eulogy on James Madison, 1836. 



uia 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 



Part Second. 



PART XX 



In an age remarkably distinguished for the encouragement which 
has seconded every advancement in art, science, and polite literature, 
it can excite no surprise that the cultivation of poetry should have 
been prosecuted with ardour in most parts of civilized Europe, and 
that many a responsive chord should have been struck in these en- 
lightened regions of the Western hemisphere. Past ages witnessed, 
with delight, the triumphant career of England in this noble develop- 
ment of intellect; and, as if nothing should be wanting to crown that 
triumph with perfection, the present age has gazed on the dawn and 
the meridian splendor of poetic genius so bright, so beautiful, so tran- 
scendant in its emanations, as to have shed, — I will not say, a halo, — 
but a dazzling radiance of glory around the temples of the British 
Muse. Nor is this the evanescent blaze of a meteor : truth is the 
basis, experience tjie test, duration the destiny, of England's newly 
earned poetical reputation. And they, the children of song, the 
gifted worthies of our time, how widely have they " enlarged the for- 
mer narrow bounds " ! While, heretofore, the literary genius of 
France could exultingly point to her tablet, and tnere present, imper- 
ishably engraven, the name of a Dacier, as an simost isolated instance 
of the supremacy of female judgment and adroitness in directin^ he 
criticism of Taste — then could my fair countrywomen do little more 
than behold and applaud. But now, how changed the scene ! True 
it is, that the women of France stil 1 maintain, as they have long been 
accustomed to maintain, a strong-, nay, even a domineering sway over 
every department in the repuWic of letters. Rousseau, adverting to 
this fact, on one occasion expressly says, " In France, all literary mat- 
ters are subject to the control of the women ; they are the curves of 
which the wise are the asymptotes." His own biographical history, as 
well as that of Voltaire, Corneiile, Marmontel, Diderot, D'Alembert, 
among others, fully corroborates the assertion. 

But, shall a despotic ascendancy like this, tolerated by the waver- 
ing caprice of fashion — exercised, often arbitrarily, wantonly exerci- 
sed at the sudden impulse of passion, interest, or party spirit, — is it 
possible, I would ask, that an ascendancy, supported on so treacher- 
ous a foundation as this, can, for a moment, vie with the homage, the 
9 



18 A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 

free, spontaneous homage, of admiration, respect, gratitude, elicited 
by the poetic fervor of a Hemans, a Baillie, a Landon, a Hannah 
More, or the fair and honorable author of "The Undying One"? — 
Here it is that my distinguished countrywomen have raised for them- 
selves an enduring monument of renown ; here have they securely 
planted a standard of independence on the broad fabric of society ; 
here have they won incontestible mastery over the invidious compari- 
sons of national rivalry ; hence have they darted new rays of lustre 
on the intellectual character of the country they adorn. 

Proceeding to the particulars of my Discourse, I shall begin with a 
definition of Poetry. 

Somewhat presumptuous, incfeed, may his task appear, who under- 
takes to define what the author of Rasselas, in the tenth chapter of 
that work, introduces and delineates in terms so intricate, so vaguely 
interwoven, as to leave the subject almost hopeless of definition. — 
But, having first deprecated the imputation of presumption, I beg 
leave to submit that, in the present instance, the sense of the passage 
ought not to be taken without certain qualifying restrictions ; nor ought 
the meaning of the " rough moralist" to be interpreted according to 
the strict letter of his positions : these must be duly modified by re- 
gard paid to the personage under whose advocacy they are advanced. 
This individual represents the enthusiast of poetry; and, as such, 
launches forth into unbounded encomiums on his favorite theme, un- 
til nearly bewildered in a labyrinth of rhapsodies. But his excursions 
receive a prompt check from a listener of discretion : his transports 
are subdued by the intervention of a judgment more calm, more pro- 
found, a spirit more serene, than his own. This being granted, — and 
the question, I think, w\\\ admit of little controversy, — it may be pos- 
sible, without incurring too severe a charge of presumption, to attempt 
some definition of Poetry— tc assign some limit to the limitless. 

Poetry is creation : — it is that creative faculty of language, which, 
by a vivid force of arrangement, while stamping the impress of reality 
on the airy nothingness of fiction, weaves a garland of ever-blooming 
freshness around the sacred altar of truth : it is that creative faculty 
which, by a captivating influence, secret, resistless, and " all its own," 
hurries away the spirit beyond the obstructions of time and space, to 
explore the viewless regions of eternity: it is that creative faculty, 
which, kindling emotions that otherwise would never have glowed 
within us, now elevates the heart with gladness, now depresses with 
sympathy, by scenes of ideal joy or lamentation, rife with the warm 
colorings of imagination. 

And is this all ? Does the extreme prerogative of Poetry centre in 
this? No : such creative faculty of language undoubtedly lies within 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 19 

teach of the orator as well as the poet — is not unfreqwntly summon- 
ed to the aid of the former, and exercised with corresponding effect. 
But let the orator beware how he proceed when heated by the energy 
of excitement. There is a certain tone of utterance, a certain grace 
of diction, the peculiar province of the poet, to trespass within the 
precincts of which would mar the efficacy of the best subject for rhe- 
torical display ;-~destitute of which accomplishment in style, the most 
imaginative writer in verse would be eminently defective as a poet. 
For conspicuous examples of this deficiency, take the versification of 
Ennius, of Cicero himself, or the dramatic writings commonly assign- 
ed to Seneca, among the ancients ; among the moderns, take the 
satires of Doctor Donne, or the railleries of Dean Swift. To the com- 
positions of these illustrious men, no one will deny merit of a high 
and indispensable order- — the merit of correct sentiment, apt illustra- 
tion, cogent argument. But where are the embellishments? where the 
melody of numbers ?— the point, the delicacy, the fire of expression, 
dignifying thought and stirring the affections, while enriehing the un- 
derstanding ? 

For these and similar attributes of poetic excellence we here look 
in vain : hence the signal failure, the neglect, not to say the total 
oblivion, to which those productions, in spite of their high origin, 
have been consigned by the tacit assent of unprejudiced posterity. 

In what, then, consists the distinction of a truly poetical style ?— - 
What peculiarities constitute a genuine claim to right of admission 
among the chosen few ? The question naturally suggests reflections 
on the two leading divisions of composition, the rhetoric and the 
prosedy of Poetry. 

The rhetoric of Poetry is a comprehensive phrase, including every 
turn of variety in expression, which serves either to refine, adorn, sim- 
plify, or animate, the conceptions of the writer. In addressing my- 
self, therefore, to the discussion of this subject, I shall not attempt to 
trace it through all the ramifications to which it extends. Such a 
course would be tiresome — in many respects, unprofitable. For the 
present purpose it will suffice to examine, and elucidate by examples, 
four principal points, which may be deemed essentially requisite to 
the attainment of success in the composition of poetry : they are these 
-—amplification, retrenchment, metaphor, pathos. 

Amplification, or enlargement, is a figure of infinite use, when pro- 
perly managed ; but one that has misled many inexperienced authors 
from the clear track of sense, to ramble in the mists of inanity. Once 
enticed by the "dangerous facility" of exuberant diction — too prone 
to the indulgence of his ardor — adrift on the expansive current of his 
ideas,— the youthful poet runs great risk of attenuating his powers itf 



20 A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 

the vapid details of description. Attend to the instructions of Pop# 
on this particular : — "It is a great fault to describe every thing : this 
is the great fault in Thompson's Seasons. The good ancients, — but 
when I named them I meant Virgil, — never indulge in long descrip- 
tions, rarely more than ten lines. The only one in Virgil is where 
.32neas is with Evander, and then it is reply to something which 
iEneasasks him." 

The error of transgression, then, on the side of descriptive ampli- 
fication, is a fatal one, and ought to be shunned very cautiously. 
Nevertheless, with all deference to the grave authority just cited, I 
shall venture to adduce two passages on the same subject, the one 
from Virgil, the other from Byron, in which, owing to the judicious 
application of amplified circumstance, the advantage in description 
must, I think, easily and decidedly rest with the modern. The sub- 
ject is shipwreck, a theme, in itself, well calculated to call forth the 
narrative powers of any writer, if he possess them. I quote from 
Dryden's translation ; and let no one object, on such account, that it 
is hardly giving fair play to the original ; for it will be found, by com- 
parison, that in this instance, at least, the original is rather improved 
upon,, than deteriorated, by the English version. 

Let the ancient take precedence : 



Orentes' bark, which bore the Lycian crew, 
Full in the hero's sight (a horrid view), 
From stem to stern by waves was overborne,— 
The trembling pilot, from the rudder torn, 
Was headlong hurl'd — thrice round the ship was tost, 
Then bulg'd at once, and in the deep was lost ; 
And here and there about the waves were seen 
Arms, pictures, precious goods, and floating men. 

Who is not ready to exclaim, how tame, cold, and prosaic? 
Turning to Byron's description, the eye of imagination there beholds 
the very terror of tempest let loose upon the elements, fraught with 
the energies of human despair : 



She gave a heel, and then a lurch to port, 
And going down head foremost, sunk, in short. 

Then rose from sea to sky the wild farewell ; 

Then shrunk the timid and stood still the brave ; 
And some leap'd overboard with dreadful yell, 

As eager to anticipate their grave ; 
And the sea yawn'd around her like a hell ; 

And down she suck'd with her the whirling wave, 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRY, «t 

Like one who grapples with his enemy, 
And strives to strangle him before he die. 

And first one universal shriek there rush'd, 

Louder than the loud ocean ; — like a crash 
Of echoing thunder ; and then all was hush'd, 

Save the wild winds and the remorseless dash 
Of billows ; but at intervals there gush'd, 

Accompanied with a convulsive splash, 
The solitary shriek and bubbling cry 
Of some strong swimmer in his agony. 

By way of contrast to the turbulent interest which pervades this 
fragment of a description, powerful throughout, I will quote another 
passage from the same author, happily depicting in the opposite ex- 
treme of tranquillity a scene dedicated to placid and devotional medi- 
tation. It is a twilight scene, and well illustrates the power of am- 
plification in sustaining the interest of prolonged description, when^ 
the materials have been skilfully selected. Milton has some lines on 
the same subject, which will serve as an apposite introduction : 

Now came still evening on, and twilight grey 
Had in her sober livery all things clad ; 
Silence accompanied ; for beast and bird, 
They to their grassy couch, these to their nest, 
Were slunk : all save the tuneful nightingale ; 
She all night long her amorous descant sung ; 
Silence was pleased. 

Byron's description runs thus : 



Ave Maria ! o'er the land and sea 

That heav'nliest hour of heaven is worthiest thee. 

Ave Maria ! blessed be the hour, 

The time, the clime, the spot, where I so oft 
Have felt that moment, in its fullest power, 

Sink o'er the earth so beautiful, so soft ! 
While swung the deep bell in the distant tower. 

Or the faint dying day-hymn stole aloft; 
And not a breath crept through the rosy air, 
And yet the forest leaves seem'd stirr'd with pray'r. 

Ave Maria ! 'tis the hour of pray'r ; 

Ave Maria ! 'tis the hour of love ; 
Ave Maria ! may our spirits dare 

Look up to thine and to thy son's above ! 
Ave Maria ! oh ! that face so fair ! 

Those downcast eyes beneath th' Almighty dove ! 



22 A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 

iVhat though 'tis but a pictured image strike ? 
That painting is no idol, 'tis too like. 

Sweet hour of twilight ! in the solitude 

Of the pine forest, and the silent shore, 
Which bounds Ravenna's immemorial wood, 

Rooted where once the Adrian wave flow'd o'er, 
To where the last Cesarean fortress stood, 

Evergreen forest ! which Boccaccio's lore, 
And Dryden's lay made haunted ground to me, 
How have I loved the twilight hour and thee ! 

The shrill cicalas, people of the pine, 

Who make their summer lives one ceaseless song,- 

Were the sole echoes, save my steed's and mine, 
And vesper bells, that rose the bowers among: 

The spectre huntsman of Onesti's line, 

His hell-dogs, and their chase, and the fair throng, 

That lsarn'd from his example not to fly 

From a true lover, shadow'd my mind's eye. 

Secondly, in regard to contraction* 

Contraction, or retrenchment, as a figure of speech, is obviously 
the converse of amplification. The chief difficulty in its adoption 
arises from a tendency which it induces, to merge into obscurity. 
But. under the judicious exercise of a master mind, how often does 
retrenchment serve to condense the energies of thought ; to surprise 
and startle the reader by sudden transition of incident; in a word, by 
some rapid and unexpected effort to agitate or allay the tumult of 
emotion. Such, for instance, is the effect in Coleridge's " Rhyme of 
the Ancient Marinere." How thrilling the touch of remorse revealed 
by the confession of the solitary offender, alone on the world of 
waters ! 

I look'd to Heaven — I tried to pray, 

But or ever a prayer had gush'd, 
A wicked whisper came, which made 

My heart as dry as dust. 

Again, what a landscape picture of serenity is exhibited in a mere 
couplet by Woodsworth : 

The swan, on still St. Mary's lake, 
Floats double, swan and shadow. 

And again, in Shelley's exquisite poem, "The Sensitive Plant," 
how affectingly drawn is the portraiture of resignation, loveliness, and 
wordless grief, in the heart of the desolate lady of the garden, who 
"had no companion of mortal race:" 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 23 

Thus through the garden, from earliest spring, 
This fairest creature went ministering ; 
She minister'd all the sweet summer tide, 
And ere the first leaf look'd brown — she died ! 

One more quotation, and I shall dismiss the subject of retrenchment : 

A king sat on the rocky brow, 

That looks o'er sea-born Salamis ; 
And ships by thousands lay below, 

And men in nations, — all were his : 
He counted them at break of day, 
And when the sun set — where were they ? 

Where were they ? Brief interrogative ! But how strikingly does 
it announce the utter prostration of tyranny, the sweeping annihila- 
tion of power, suddenly thwarting [the schemes of insolent and over- 
reaching ambition. 

Thirdly, in regard to metaphor. 

Metaphor has been thus familiarly defined by Doctor Stirling: 

A metaphor in place of proper words, 
Resemblance puts, and dress to speech affords. 

I say familiarly, but not accurately, to the full extent of the defini- 
tion : because if it is to be understood that metaphor is nothing but 
a substitute for commonplace expression, just as it may suit the con- 
venience, applicable or inapplicable to the sense of the writer, the 
assumption is unwarrantable. In other respects the learned Doctor's 
position is tenable enough: metaphor certainly is a "resemblance, 1 ' 
a " dress" afforded to the customary and colloquial fashion of com- 
municating ideas. Thus, for example, in the opening stanza of 
Grey's celebrated Ode on the subjection of Scotland by Edward the 
First : 

Ruin seize thee, ruthless king, 

Confusion on thy banners wait : 
Though fann'd by conquest's crimson wing, 
They mock the air in idle state. 

Here we have a description completely metaphorical, the genius of 
victory hovering with blood-stained wings over a conquering army. 
What is this, in plain language, but the figurative and poetical de- 
scription of a victorious soldiery flushed with recent success, and 
marching onward in the buoyant anticipation of achieving additional 
conquests? But, on the ground of the Doctor's definition, will any 
one assert that the poet's expression is improper! If so, away, then, 



24 A DISCOURSE Otf POETRY. 

at once with the metaphorical embellishment of poetical composition* 
But no : there is no room for contention against the standard author- 
ity of the best writers : metaphor, and metophor alone, can support 
; the truth of poetical assimilation: when injudiciously admitted it is 
emphatically condemned as " harsh" metaphor: its real character 
appears to be this, — The appropriate transfusion of expression from 
the direct style of narrative to that of energetic simile introduced for 
the clearer elucidation of description. 

Fourthly, in regard to pathos. 

Pathos cannot be properly designated a rhetorical figure ; but it is 
an attribute on which the very spirit and vital essence of poetry so 
strictly depend, that it cannot be overlooked in any, even the slightest 
notice of the subject. And why is this ? Because pathos is feeling, 
and "feeling in a poet is a source of others' feeling." A poem may 
be replete with every ornament of style which the perfection of art 
can communicate ; but if the persuasion of eloquence does not per- 
vade the diction, — that persuasion which is a power far beyond the 
range of formal rule, — it awakens no conviction in the heart. A 
statue may be chiselled with every grace of symmetry and sculptural 
precision : why, then, after a due tribute of admiration paid to the 
accomplishment of manual skill, does the beholder turn away un- 
moved and indifferent? The reason is this: — he has witnessed a 
production, finished indeed, according to the nicest precepts and 
criticism of art, but unimbued with the expression of nature : the 
statue is complete ; but, still, mere marble, cold, spiritless, inanimate. 
And thus it is with poetry: there must not only be the "master's 
hand," but the " prophet's fire," or you strike the chords in vain. 
The poet himself must feel, and that intensely, before he can hope 
to engage the sympathies of others. " It is not enough," says the 
accurate Roman teacher on this subject, " that poems be beautiful ; 
let them be tender and affecting, and bear away the soul of the au- 
ditor wheresoever they please. As the human countenance smiles on 
those that smile, so does it sympathise with those that weep. If 
you would have me weep, you must first express the passion of grief 
yourself; then, Telephus, or Peleus, your misfortunes really hurt me ; 
but if you pronounce the parts assigned you ill, I shall either fall 
asleep or laugh/' 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 

Fart Third. 



FART XXX. 



My next consideration is the Prosody of English poetry. 

At the first view, the discussion of this topic may appear dry and 
uninteresting. . I shall endeavor so to treat it as to avoid being prolix 
and tedious, on the one hand; too concise and technical, on the 
other. 

The prosody of English poetry, in its application to the rhythmical 
construction of verse, admits of easy and familiar definition. With 
us, accent and quantity, in the prosodical acceptation of the term, are 
one and the same thing. If our modern bards now and then com- 
plain about the fetters of rhyme,-~that " sometimes kings are not 
more imperative than rhymes;" yet have these same bards ample rea- 
son to rejoice in being untrammelled by the closer and more finely 
drawn threads of perplexity, spun out from the intricacies of long 
and short syllables. A good ear, improved by attention to the ac- 
knowledged standard of correct pronunciation, is the safe and sure 
guide to harmony of numbers. Hence it happens that the effusion of 
a rustic muse, like that of Burns, Blomfield, Clare, or the Ettrick 
Shepherd, flow with a cadence smooth and appropriate as that which 
graces the style of a More, a Rogers, a Wordworth, or a Campbell, 
notwithstanding the advantage, on the side of the latter, of their 
early initiation into the classical mysteries of quantity. 

In confirmation of this opinion, hear the sentiments of " the Citi- 
zen of the World," who thus writes on this very particular: " Several 
rules have been drawn up for varying the poetic measure ; and critics 
have elaborately talked of accents and syllables: but good sense 
and a fine ear, which rules can never teach, are alone what can, in 
such a case, determine. The rapturous flowings of joy, or the inter- 
ruptions of indignation, require accents placed entirely different, and 
a structure consonant to the emotions they would express. Changing 
passions, and numbers changing with those passions, make the whole 
secret of Western as well as Eastern poetry. In a word, 'the great 
faults of the modern professed English poets are, that they seem to 
want numbers, which should vary with the passions, and are more 
employed in describing to the imagination, than striking at the heart." 
It should be observed, however, that the faults noticed in the last 



28 A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 

period have been abundantly redeemed by the writers of Englisfe 
poetry since the time of Goldsmith, who levelled this critique at the 
head of inferior versifiers cotemporary with himself. 

A wide field to expatiate in does, indeed, open itself in regard to 
the manifold distinctions of metre. But let the subtile investigation 
of a question so abstruse rest with the grammarians ; present purpo- 
ses will be answered by summarily adverting to the more prominent 
points of the question. So far as the remains of the classical poetry 
of antiquity are concerned, none but those whose course of study 
may have immediately directed their attention to the subject, can form 
an adequate idea of the torture inflicted by metrical disquisition on the 
ingenuity of the most celebrated critics ; the treasures of profound 
erudition exhausted in the research. By the lucid and convincing ex- 
position of Professor Porson more than others, the matter has recently 
been set in its proper light, and the chief difficulties removed. This 
sensible man, with surprising acumen, speedily detected, and as 
speedily exploded, the fallacy of many favorite theories, which had 
been defended, time immemorial, by a host of predecessors in the 
same entangled walk of criticism. But it remained for Porson to 
pluck up by the roots those weeds that encumbered the path; and this 
he did with an unsparing hand. Advancing with deliberation, sifting 
every specious dogma with the scrutiny of analogical reasoning, he 
arrived at those conclusions, which enabled him to pronounce such 
decisions on the legitimate structure of Greek verse, and the Greek 
language generally, as never have been, nor, in all likelihood, ever 
will be, reversed. 

To the critical labors of this great man, then, are thanks deser- 
vedly due from the rising generation of classical students. He 
has rescued them from a world of difficulty ; has presented them 
with a clue of escape from a labyrinth of errors ; has prevented the 
abstraction of their ideas from objects of attention infinitely more 
profitable ; and has, thus, tendered the facilities accruing from a va- 
luable acquisition of time in the prosecution of their classical re- 
searches. 

Returning from the digression, let me proceed to examine the lead- 
ing principles of English metre. 

There is a definition laid down by Harris well worth quoting in 
this place. It is this: "Rhythm differs from metre, inasmuch as rhythm 
is proportion applied to any motion whatever, metre is proportion ap- 
plied to words spoken : thus, in the drumming of a march, or the 
dancing of a hornpipe, there is rhythm, but no metre: in Dryden's 
celebrated ode there is metre as well as rhythm, because the rhythm 
is accompanied by certain words." 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRY* 29 

The two grand divisions of poetical construction are the heroic and 
the lyric : the rhythmical structure of each depends on the fitting ar- 
rangement of four different measures or feet, distinguished by syllabic 
accent, namely, the iambic, trochaic, dactylic, and anapestic. 

The iambic measure is the basis of structure in English heroic 
verse. This term, heroic, is merely conventional, and by no means 
descriptive of the various subjects to which the structure is frequently 
adapted. First applied to the celebration of heroic achievements, in 
epic poetry, it thence derived the name ; but, owing to the particular 
recommendation of its pliancy, it was subsequently transferred to sub- 
jects^widely different in their nature, pastoral, narrative, or didactic ; 
as in Goldsmith's "Deserted Village;" Campbell's "Gertrude of 
Wyoming ;" Falconer's "Shipwreck," and Pope's "Essay on Man."* 

1. tThe heroic iambic verse consists of ten syallables, having the 
accents on every second one : thus, 

And drags at each remove a len'gth'ning chain. 

2. t The trochaic measure also consists of two syllables, having the 
accent on the first : thus, 

or where Hebrus wanders, 
rolling in meanders. 

3. The anapestic foot consists of three syllables, the accent falling 
on the third : thus, 

as a beam on the face of the waters may glow. 

4. The dactylic foot also consists of three syllables, having the ac- 
cent on the first : thus, 

silent, Moyle, be the roar of thy waters. 

In examining the nature of these four several measures or feet, it 
is observable that each has its converse : the third and fourth are prin- 



*In the same manner was the elegiac metre, among the Greek and Roman poets, 
diverted from its original application which confined it to subjects of a mournful na- , 
ture. It still remains unknown who was the first to use this very pleasing style of 
verse : 

Flebilis indignos Elegeia solve capillos. — Ovid. 

fSyllaba longa brevi subjecta vocatur iambus.— Hor. O P, 

I Sometimes called choree, 



qa A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 

cipally introduced where vehemence and rapidity of expression are 

^ i" have said that the iambic measure is the basis of structure in 
English heroic verse. This peculiarity, however, does not preclude 
its admission into lyric composition, although the latter chiefly com- 
prehends the divisions and subdivisions of the other three metres 
above specified. Of this we have 'a fine example in Bryden's cele- 
brated Ode referred to by Harris, one strophe of which I will here 

present : 

At length, with love and wine at once opprest, 
The vanquish'd victor sunk upon her breast. 

Now strike the golden lyre again, 
A louder yet and yet a louder strain : 
Break his bands of sleep asunder, 
And rouse him like a rattling peal of thunder. 

Hark ! hark ! the horrid sound 

Has rais'd up his head, 

As awaked from the dead, 
And amazed he stares around. 

Revenge ! revenge ! Timotheus cries, 

See the Furies arise ! 

See the snakes that they rear, 

How they hiss in their hair, 
And the sparkles that flash from their eyes. 

Behold a ghastly band, 

Each a torch in his hand! 
These are Grecian ghosts that in battle were slain, 

And, unburied, remain 

Inglorious on the plain : 

Give the vengence due 

To the valient crew. 
Behold ! how they toss their torches on high, 

And point to the glittering abodes 

And temples of their hostile Gods f 
The princes applaud with a furious joy, 
And the king seiz'd a flambeau with zeal to destroy : 

Thais led the way 

To light him to his prey, 
And like another Helen she fired another Troy. 

Before quitting the subject of metrical doctrine, I cannot refrain 
from alluding to an eccentric attempt made by an author of celebrity, 
Doctor Southey, in his political apotheosis and anathema, " The 
Vision of Judgment," to introduce a novel style of rhythmical con- 
struction, modelled on the plan of the Greek and Latin hexameter. 
The construction of this kind of verse is concisely exhibited, in his 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 31 

usual happy vein, by Coleridge, in a couplet entitled " The Homeric 
Hexameter described and exemplified:" 

Strongly it bears us along in swelling and limitless billows, 
Nothing before and nothing behind but the sky and the ocean. 

To which, by way of corollary, I may add another couplet by the 
same, entitled, "The Ovidian elegiac verse described and exem- 
plified :" 

In the hexameter rises the fountain's silvery column ; 
In the pentameter aye falling in melody back. 

To return to Mr. Southey : his attempt was a failure. The genius 
of the English language is repugnant to the plan. The accentual 
principal of our versification rejects that spondaic combination of 
syllables, the gravity of which is necessary to temper and moderate 
the rapid flow of the dactylic metre. Besides, English readers were 
taken by surprise : they scarcely knew what to make of the innova- 
tion. The attempt, therefore, failed, as I have said. Not only that; 
it held out an inviting handle of derision to the Laureate's unsleeping 
adversary, Byron; and the noble satirist clutched it, con amove. 
Toward the conclusion of the famous retort, pointedly styled by the 
author his Vision of Judgment, the Doctor is thus facetiously ban- 
tered on the subject of his metrical abortion ; 

Now the bard, glad to get an audience, which 

By no means often was his case below, 
Began to cough, and hawk, and hem, and pitch 

His voice to that unhappy note of wo, 
To all unhappy hearers, within reach 

Of poets when the tide of rhyme's in flow; 
But stuck fast in his first hexameter, 
Not one of all whose gouty feet would stir. 

But ere the spavin'd dactyls could be spurr'd 

Into recitative, in great dismay 
Both cherubim and seraphim were heard 

To murmur loudly in their long array ; 
And Michael rose, ere he could get a word 

Of all his founder'd verses under weigh, 
And cried, " for heaven's sake stop, my friend,— -'twere best,— 
" Non di non homines" — you know the rest." 

The tumult grew : a universal cough 
Convulsed the skies, 



32 A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 

A few words may be here introduced respecting a portion of the 
mythological poetry of antiquity. Those hymns, which long passed 
under the name of Homeric, but which it appears from the concurrent 
testimony of critics, no longer ought to be ascribed to " the old bard 
of Scio's Rocky Isle ;" those hymns, I say, no matter by whom com- 
posed, sufficiently indicate the enthusiasm of zeal that animated the 
votaries of pagan worship. Among the literary wrecks of ages, these 
hymns stand forth, the beautiful relics of a structure surpassingly 
noble in its primeval state of completion, — like the stupendous archi- 
tectural ruins of a Thebes or a Luxor, astonishing us with the gran- 
deur of their very decay. These hymns exhibit a happy combination 
of almost every accessary to poetical effect ; — propriety of adaptation, 
nerve of diction, splendour of imagery, all contribute to impart those 
characteristics of excellence, which distinguish them as master-pieces 
in their way. English readers have lately been gratified with an oppor- 
tunity of judging for themselves on the boasted merits of these famous 
compositions, by the translations, which, since the year 1830, have, 
from time to time, been given from the pen of the Rev. Mr. Eagles; — 
translations presenting a correct model of style in themselves, being, 
as they are, perfect specimens of what translations ought to be,— a 
faithful transcript of the sense and the spirit ; no copy, servile to the 
mere letter of the original. 

Here, then, are compositions in poetry confessedly graced with 
every attraction of style, every qualification capable of exciting in- 
terest. Will it be contradictory to assert, that the uttermost interest 
they can excite is only superficial ? Certainly not, if regard be paid 
to existing views and considerations of the subject to which they are 
dedicated. The delusion of the times when they were written, — a 
delusion which such productions must, in any age or country, strongly 
tend to foster, — has, happily, passed away, — has vanished "like the 
baseless fabric of a dream." These compositions, therefore, splendid 
as they are, no longer meet with reciprocity of sentiment; they no 
longer wear the spell of reverential address. How different is it with 
the sacred effusions of our writers subsequent to the later dates of 
Christianity, who touched on those "heavenly themes" to which 
" subiimer strains" belong. They composed in the spirit of truth and 
perfect holiness ; therefore will their labors bear the test of all time. 
One instance out of several, that might be adduced, will suffice. 
How insignificant are the adventitious adornments of mythological 
machinery, aided by a facination of expression inconceiveable, when 
brought into comparison with the simplicity and majesty conveyed in 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 33 

every line of Milton's glorious " Hymn on the Nativity,"* of which 
I shall quote the first and two concluding stanzas: 

The oracles are dumb, 

No voice, or hideous hum, 
Runs through the arch'd roof in words deceiving : 

Apollo from his shrine, 

Can no more divine, 
With hollow shriek the step of Delphos cleaving : 

No mighty trance, or breathed spell, 
Inspires the pale-eye 'd priest from the prophetic cell. 

Nor is Osiris seen 

In Memphian grove or green, 
Trampling the unshorn grass with lowings loud : 

He cannot be at rest, 

Within his sacred chest : 
Nought but profoundest hell can be his shroud: 

In vain, with timbrell'd anthems dark, 
The sable stoled priests surround the mystic ark. 

Nor all the Gods beside 

Longer durst abide ; 
Not Typhon huge, ending in snaky twine : 

They can no more withstand 

The dreaded Infant's hand : 
The rays of Bethlehem blind their dusty eyne : 

Our babe, to prove his God-head true, 
Can with a single glance dispel the damned crew.f 

In drawing these brief and imperfect remarks to a conclusion, I 
have to observe, that, whether placed in competition with the produc- 
tions of the best authors of antiquity, or of those of the highest name, 
in modern times, on the continent of Europe, the literature of the 
English language can now confidently claim an equality, at the least, 
in every branch of poetic excellence. The boldest flights of heroic 
rapture ; the wildest sweeping, the deepest wailing of the iEolian 
lyre ; the tuneful strains of pastoral simplicity, — have successively 
delighted and surprised an attentive throng of admirers; — have been, 
successively, rewarded with the most flattering tributes, — the tributes 
of just and general appreciation. 

Nor can it be doubted that an improved taste for poetical reading 
exerts an important influence over the social and individual happi- 



* This, I believe, was a very early production of Milton's. 
fThis quotation is, I fear, a little incorrect. Vide notice, page 1 



34 A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 

nesS) — the moral and intellectual character of a community. Wit- 
ness the observations of a liberal ethical writer, Jeremy Bentham : 
" When our own mind is unable to furnish ideas of pleasure, with 
which to drive out the impressions of pain, these ideas may frequently 
be found in the writings of others ; and when the expressions of the 
writer are particularly suitable to the circumstances of the reader, the 
effect will be still more potent. Poetry often lends itself to this be- 
nevolent purpose ; and where truth and judgment ; reason and reflec- 
tion ; harmony and sense combine, happy, indeed, is the influence." 

Witness, again, the band of brotherhood with which the cultivation 
of poetical taste and genius, binds the generous sympathies of men, 
in other respects existing strangers to each other and unknown. This 
was feelingly expressed by the accomplished Washington Irving, 
when, a few years ago, the elegant poems of William Cullen Bryant 
were first published in London. Mr. Irving, in his dedicatory letter 
to Samuel Rogers, author of the " Pleasures of Memory," writes thus : 
"During an intimacy of some years' standing, I have uniformly re- 
marked a liberal interest on your part in the rising character and for- 
tunes of my country, and a kind disposition to promote the success 
of American talent, whether engaged in literature or the arts. I am 
induced, therefore, as a tribute of gratitude, as well as a general testi- 
monial of respect and friendship, to lay before you the present volume, 
in which, for the first time, are collected together the fugitive pro- 
ductions of one of our living poets, whose writings are deservedly 
popular throughout the United States." 

Pleasing testimony of cordiality in the sentiments of high-minded 
men ! To which, by way of comment, it will not be irrelevant to add 
the suffrage of another writer on the same subject, as an ample proof 
that the spirit of congeniality is by no means exclusively limited to 
poetical intercourse, on either side of the Atlantic. " I confess," 
says this writer, " I augur most favorably of the taste of a country, 
throughout which poetry so refined in sentiment, and so pure in ex- 
ecution and ornament, as that contained in Mr. Bryant's volume, en- 
joys popularity. A warm admiration of the works of nature, strong 
religious feeling towards the great Author of these works, a singular 
happiness of description, and of clothing his descriptions with moral 
associations, that make them speak to the heart ; an independent 
spirit, and the buoyant aspirations incident to a youthful and a rising 
country, are among the charming characteristics of this American 
poet." 

Brief, indeed, has been the earthly career of many, the most dis- 
tinguished competitors for poetical fame. Of many a one, as of him, 
in whose honor a kindred spirit first prompted the line, may it be 



A DISCOURSE ON POETRY. 35 

truly said "that science 'self destroy'd her favorite son." But the 
labors of the illustrious departed still survive ; the works proclaim the 
worth of the authors, enshrining their memory in the hearts of pos- 
terity, — marking as hallowed ground the track they trod. Nay, is 
there not a certain cheering relief, a joyous rebound of hope and 
ecstacy springing from the very contemplation itself of the early des- 
tiny, that unexpectedly summons the youthful poet to seek, or, rather, 
to regain, his "native home above ?" 

Whom the Gods love die young, was said of yore, 

And many deaths do they escape by this ; 
The death of friends, and that which slays even more, 

The, death of friendship, love, youth, — all that is, 
Except mere breath ; and since the silent shore 

Awaits, at last, even those whom longest miss 
The old Archer's shafts, perhaps the early grave, 
Which~men_weep over, may be meant to save. 

On every such bereavement I would, finally, pronounce the inspi- 
riting strain of consolation breathed forth by the " prince of poets," 
Milton, in that most plaintive of pastorals, Lycidas : 

Alas ! what boots it, with incessant care, 

To tend the homely, slighted shepherd's trade, 

And strictly meditate the thankless muse ? 

Were it not better done, as others use, 

To sport with Amaryllis in the shade, / - 

fl,/ Or with the tangles of Necer J's hair ? 

/ Fame is the spur, which the'clear spirit doth rai«e 
/ (That last infirmity of noble mind,) 

To scorn delights and live laborious days ; 

But the bright guerdon when we hope to find, 

And think to burst out into sudden blaze, 

Comes;the blind Fury, with th' abhorred shears, 

And slits the thin-spun life. '« But not the praise," 

Phoebus replied, and touch'd my trembling ears, 

Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil, 

Nor in the glittering foil 

Set off to the world ; nor in broad j:umor lies ; 

But lives, and spreads aloft, to those pure eyes, 

And perfect witness of all-judging Jove : 

As he pronounces lastly on each deed, 

Of so much fame in Heaven expect thy?«ld. 



*♦ 



\ 



REMARK'S 

ON THE 

ORIGIN AND STUDY OF CB^aiA-lIX MODERN LANGUAGES. 

Vi vineta egomet coedam mea. — Hor. 



REMARKS ON THE ORIGIN AND STUDY OF CERTAIN 
MODERN LANGUAGES. 



The varieties of the human race may be distributed according to 
their physical conformation, or their languages, or both of these may 
be combined to form one uniform arrangement, in which the primary 
divisions may be taken from the conformation, and the secondary from 
the distinction of languages. The physical conformation includes 
shape and complexion, and under these general heads embraces the 
form of the skull, the facial angle or inclination of the forehead, the 
general form of the face, the features, the color and texture of the 
hair and skin, the color and shape of the eyes, &c. 

Languages are distinguished by their roots, or radicals, the simple 
names of the most universal objects, and by their grammatical struc- 
ture, or the rules according to which words are inflected and combin- 
ed, so as to form a sentence. 

The primary divisions drawn from the physical conformation will 
not be brought under full consideration here, but only those seconda- 
ry ones dependent on the affinities of language. For more ample 
information on the former part of this subject, the reader is referred 
to the " Mithridates" of Adelung and Vater; or the "Appendix" by 
James Percival, M. D., to " A Geographical View of the World," by 
the Rev. J. Goldsmith, second edition, New York. D. M. Jewett, 
1829. 

The Caucassian Race is characterized by a skull nearly spherical 
or regularly rounded, and an oval shape of the entire head. Facial 
angle, in the adult, 85°. Face oval and straight, forehead high and 
prominent. Nose narrow at the base, elevated and rather aquiline ; 
mouth small and well formed, lips thin ; chin full and rounded: whole 
figure rounded and symmetrical. 

This race alone furnishes ideal models for the statuary. Complexion 
fair when not exposed to the sun and weather. This is true of the 
higher ranks of the Arabs and Hindoos, who live secluded in their 
palaces and harems. Cuticle transparent, cheeks tinged with blushes. 
Hair fine, and of all shades from black to yellow and red, more or less 
disposed to curl, but never frizzled. Eyes corresponding to the gen- 



40 REMARKS ON THE ORIGIN ANI> STUDT 

eral complexion, varying from deep black, through every shade of 
grey, to light blue. 

There are two varieties of complexion in this race, the brown and 
the light. The complexion of the brown variety is pure white; but, 
by exposure, it tans, or becomes brown; eyes generally dark; hair 
black, or dark brown, sometimes dark red. The complexion of the 
light variety is very fair and ruddy,- with a thinner cuticle ; by expo- 
sure it freckles or becomes reddish; hair light brown, yellow, or light 
red, and sometimes flaxen. Eyes blue or light grey. The person is 
larger and more inclined to corpulence, and the eyes smaller than in 
the brown variety. It is principally confined to the Gothic family, 
which it characterizes. All the other families of this race belong to 
the brown variety. The Hindoos and the ancient Egyptians, with 
their descendants, the Copts, belong to this race, but are considered 1 
by Blumenbach intermediate between it and the Malay or Negro. 

The exact limits of the Caucassian and Negro races in Africa, are 
not ascertained. They run along that part of Africa which has been 
least explored, the country between the Nile and the Niger. As far 
as the country has been explored, the two races have been found in- 
termingled on the frontier, which probably crosses the continent from 
Senegal, by Tombuctoo and Darfur, to Abyssinia, along the southern 
boundary of the Great Desert. 

From the preceding sketch of the Caucassian race, it will be found 
to occupy all Europe, and nearly half of Asia and Africa, besides its 
extensive colonies. It includes the most civilized nations, and indeed 
all that have made any great progress, or have shown any high inven- 
tive power. It is not only the most enterprising and intelligent, but the 
most elegant of all the races, excelling them in complexion, features, 
and form. The civilization of the other races, after gaining a certain 
point, has continued stationary. They have formed extensive govern- 
ments, and sustained a crowded population, and have, indeed, erected 
the greatest of all known cities, but their habits, their arts, and their 
science, as far as they have had any, have been marked by a want of 
taste and action. Wherever they have come in contact with Caucas- 
sians the latter have prevailed, except in the short triumphs of the 
Mongols, under Genghis and Timur. 



OF CERTAIN MODERN LANGUAGES. 41 



AFFINITIES OF LANGUAGE 



THE PELASGIC. 

This is styled by Adelung the Thraco-Pelasgic Greek and Latin 
stock. All the languages from which this long name is derived are 
extinct as spoken languages, and only exist, to any extent, in the 
modern Greek, and the Roman languages of southern Europe. This 
family originally occupied the countries around the Euxine, Asia 
Minor, Turkey in Europe, and then Italy. They are supposed to 
have come from central Asia, by the north side of the Black sea. In 
the earliest periods they were divided into two great branches. 1. 
The Thraco-IIlyrian occupied all the north of European Turkey, from 
the Peneus and the Archipelago to the Carpathian mountains, and 
the Dneiper, and from the Black sea to the head of the Adriatic. 
This was their original seat, from which they settled the western half 
of Asia Minor, driving before them the original inhabitants of the 
Semitic family, 

The original seat of the Pelasgic was in Thessaly and Epirus, from 
which they settled all the south of Greece, and the islands, and sent 
colonies to Italy and Asia Minor: probably of the same origin with 
the Thracians: the last traces of their language were found in 
Arcadia. 

From this branch the ancient Greek was derived. The earliest 
Greeks were called Hellenes, a Pelasgic tribe from the mountains of 
Thessaly, who settled in the plains of Thessaly and Boeotia, and 
formed a strong government, which gradually extended its influence 
over Greece, and formed a national union. The oldest form of the 
Greek was Eolic ; which had a near affinity to the Pelasgic, and con- 
tinued the dialect of the mountaineers in northern Greece and Arca- 
dia. It was the language of several colonies in Italy, where it con- 
tributed to form the Latin, and of others in Asia Minor, where it was 
cultivated in Lesbos and the adjoining coast, and formed the Eolic of 
Sappho. 

From this early form proceeded other dialects, viz., the Doric, from 
Doris, carried by the Herdclidan into the Peloponnesus, of which it 
J2 



42 REMARKS ON THE ORIGIN AND STUDY 

became the prevailing language, and was thence extended by its co- 
lonies to Sicily, the South of Italy, &c. 

The Ionic, originally from Achaia, then established in Attica, from 
which it was carried into Asia Minor, and there formed the prevailing 
dialect of the more cultivated districts. It there attained a high de- 
gree of perfection, became very soft and musical, and the language of 
poetry and refinement. 

The Ajttic, formed out of the remains of the old Ionic, modified by 
the Eolic ; hence it became more concise and nervous, and, as Athens 
gained the ascendancy, it became the ruling language of Greece. 

After the time of Alexander the language became more general, 
the dialects gradually disappeared, and the Hellenic Greek, or the 
universal language of communication wherever the influence of Gre- 
cian power or learning was known, was finally established. It was 
then the prevailing language of all the countries governed by the 
princes of the family of Alexander, and had afterwards a wide influ- 
ence under the Roman empire'. It finally became the established 
language of the Eastern empire at Constantinople, and the sacred 
language of the Greek Church. The gradual influence of time, the 
irruptions of the Northern barbarians and Saracens, into the Eastern 
empire, and its final conquest by the Turks, entirely rooted out the 
old language, and it now remains only in books, and in the prayers of 
the Greek Church. The modern Greek, or Romaic, is formed from 
the vulgar dialect ; not from the ancient written language. It was 
first corrupted by the Romans, and since by the successive invasions 
of the Goths, Tartars, Turks, &c. In some districts, particularly in 
the interior of Asia Minor, the Greeks have entirely lost their lan- 
guage, and speak the Turkish. They, however, use the ancient Greek 
in their churches, and write their Turkish in Greek characters. The 
modern Greek is now spoken throughout Greece Proper, the Morea, 
and the Egean islands: it is also spoken on the coasts of Asia Minor 
as far as Constantinople ; in Cyprus, and the Ionian islands. The 
Greeks have long been a maritime and commercial people, and they 
may be found in considerable numbers in most of the ports of the 
Mediterranean. There are several provincial dialects, of which the 
purest are said to be those of Mount Athos and the Cyclades. The 
language is less inflected than the ancient Greek, and makes a greater 
use of auxiliaries. It has only very recently been cultivated, and can- 
not boast of any standards in literature.* 



* For specimens of Romaic composition, prose and verse, together with a list of 
Homaic authors and their works, consult the "Notes " to the fourth canto of Childe 
Harold. 



OF CERTAIN MODERN LANGUAGES. 43 

The ancient inhabitants of Italy were of five distinct nations. 

1. The Ulyrians, a Thracian tribe, who entered from the North 
East, and advanced to the extremity of Sicily. The Siculi were one 
of their divisions. 

2. The Iberi, from Spain ; they entered by Liguria, and advanced 
along the Mediterranean coast into Sicily. The Sicani were one'of 
their divisions. 

3. The Celts or Gauls, who entered Italy from the Tyrol; the an- 
cestors of the Umbri and Insubri. 

4. The Pelasgi, called also Aborigines. These formed most of the 
small states in central Italy, the Sabines, Latins, Samnites, &c. They 
probably came from Thessaly, through Illyria, some have thought by 
sea. 

5. The Etruscans. Proper name, Rasena; a Celtic tribe from 
Rhcetia ; overran the greater part of Northern Italy. Their empire 
had its seat in Tuscany, near the source of the Arno : they were 
powerful and civilized, but less so than is generally supposed. fMany 
remains of their language are to be found in inscriptions : they pre- 
sent a compound of Celtic and Pelasgic. Their language was spo- 
ken on the Po in the reign of Claudius. 

Several early Greek colonies of the Eolian dialect settled in Latium, 
and by their union with the old Pelasgian and Umbrian dialects, the 
Latin was formed. It is therefore radically Greek and Celtic, of 
which the Greek predominates. There were many provincial dialects 
in the neighbourhood of Rome, but as the Roman power increased 
the Latin gained the ascendancy. Like all other languages it slowly 
advanced to its perfection, which it finally attained in the age of Au- 
gustus. It afterwards gradually declined under the Emperors, and 
finally became extinct, as a vernacular language, by the invasions of 
the Northern barbarians. It still continued the language of learning, 
religion, and government, though greatly corrupted ; and on the revi- 
val of learning it became the language of general communication 
throughout Europe. It is still the sacred language of the Catholic 
Church, and is the only one used in their religious services. 

The Romans carried their language, as well as their laws, through 
all the conquered nations, particularly in the West of Europe. It 
gradually blended itself with the original languages of the conquered, 
giving them a decidedly Latin character, and thus forming what was 
called the Roman rustica, and afterwards the Roman or Romance lan- 
guages. These were afterwards modified by the conquests of the 
Northern barbarians, and from them the four great languages of 
Southern Europe, with their dialects, have been formed. They all 
differ from the Latin by fewer inflexions, and the use of articles and 
auxiliaries. 



44 REMARKS ON THE ORIGIN AND STUDY 

ITALIAN. 

The written and cultivated Italian is the Florentine or Tuscan. It 
is the language of literature and general communication though all 
Italy, the South Swiss cantons, Corsica, Sardinia, Sicily, and Malta. 
Its earliest standards were Dante and Petrarca, in the fourteenth and 
fifteenth centuries. It has since been carefully cultivated, and boasts 
a long series of able writers, such as Boccaccio, Tasso, Ariosto, Mac- 
chiavelli, Davila, Giannone, Metastasio, Alfieri, &c. The purest pro- 
nunciation of Italian is in Rome, (hence the saying, " lingua To s- 
cana in bocca Romana;) that of Florence is too guttural. There are 
numerous dialects in Italy. Those in the North are more mixed with 
Gothic, harder, shorter, and with fewer vowel endings. Those of the 
South are softer, fuller, and more abundant in vowels, particularly in 
their terminations. The principal are the Piedmontese, Ligurian, 
Milanese, Berganese — very contracted, — Lombard, Bolognese, Pa- 
duan, Friulese. These all belong to the Northern contracted division. 
The Venetian, soft and pleasant ; Tuscan, very guttural ; Roman, the 
polite Roman, the most musical in Italy ; Neapolitan, abounding in 
vowels; the Sicilian, abounding in Arabic and Provencal words ; the 
Sardinian and Corsican. The Lingua Franca, a general dialect of 
communication in the ports of the Mediterranean, has its basis in the 
Italian, but is corrupted by a mixture of Greek, Arabic, Turkish, &c. 

SPANISH. 

This language, originally Roman, was very considerably modified 
by the Visi-Goths, and afterwards by the Arabic of the Moors. The 
Castilian dialect furnished the basis of the present cultivated Spanish, 
which is now the general language of Spain, and all the Spanish co- 
lonies in America, the West Indies, and the Philippines. Next to 
the English, it is the most widely diffused of all the European lan- 
guages. The Castilian was written with the greatest purity in the six- 
teenth and seventeenth centuries. Since the accession of the house 
of Bourbon, it has been modified by the French. 

The principal Spanish writers are Lope de Vega, Calderon, Cer- 
vantes, Ercilla, Quevedo, Mariana, Herrera, &c. 

There are several dialects in Spain, which may be classed under 
two divisions : 

1. The North-Eastern, which have a close affinity to the Provengal, 
and are not Arabicized. The Catalonian, Arragonian, Valencian, and 
Mallorcan. 



OF CERTAIN MODERN LANGUAGES. 45 

2. The Southern and Western, more Arabicized, and less modified 
by the French ; the Castilian, the basis of the Spanish ; the Gallician^ 
the basis of the Portuguese, a much ruder and more contracted dia- 
lect; the Andalusian and Grenadian, highly Arabicized, and the most 
corrupt in Spain. 

PORTUGUESE. 

This language took its origin from the Gallician dialect, and, by 
the establishment of the Portuguese monarchy, it has been raised to 
its present rank as a written and cultivated language. It has many 
Arabic words, and abounds in Latin words more than the Spanish. It 
is very contracted, often leaving out consonants and even entire syl- 
lables. It is the general language of Portugal and the Portuguese 
colonies in Brazil, Africa, and the East Indies. A very corrupt Por- 
tuguese is quite common on the coasts of South Hindostan and 
Ceylon. 

The Portuguese has been cultivated as long as the Spanish, but is 
not so well known abroad. Its standard writer is Camoens ; others, 
as Joam Barros, Manoel, &c, are less known. 

FRENCH. 

The Roman language of France was modified by the Franks and 
Goths into two principal dialects, the Southern or Langue d'oc, and 
the Northern or Langue d'oi. The Southern was the earliest culti- 
vated at the great feudal courts of Provence, Toulouse, and Barce- 
lona, thus giving rise to the Provengal or Limousin language, of which 
there are numerous poetical remains. The poets of this dialect were 
called Trobadors. It has not been a cultivated language since the 
fourteenth century. The Northern, or Langue d'oi, was early culti- 
vated at the French and Norman courts, and like the former was prin- 
cipally devoted to poetry. Its poets were called Trouveres. Richard 
I. of England was one of their number. The crusades against the 
Albigenses, and the wars between the French and English in Guienne, 
carried it South, and the overthrow of the courts of Provence and 
Toulouse, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, gave it the ascen- 
dancy in that quarter. The Provencal then declined, and has finally 
sunk into a provincial patois. 

After the consolidation of the French government by Louis XL it 
became the prevailing language of the Kingdom, and soon one of the 
most cultivated languages of Europe, particularly under the auspices 
of Francis I. It gained its highest perfection in the reign of Louis 



4 5 REMARKS ON THE ORIGIN AND STUDY 

XIV. It has since had many eminent writers, but is thought to have- 
rather declined in purity. Its leading writers are Montaigne, Cor- 
neille, Racine, Moliere, Bossuet, Fenelon, Boileau, La Fontaine, 
Montesquieu, Pascal, Voltaire, Rousseau, D'Alembert, and others. 
It is the general language of communication throughout France, the 
Western districts of Switzerland, and the French colonies in Canada, 
Louisiana, the West Indies, Guiana, and the isles of France and 
Bourbon. 

During the last two centuries the French language has been a gen- 
eral medium of intercourse throughout the continent of Europe, par- 
ticularly in the Northern courts, and in diplomatic papers. 

There are many provincial dialects in France, viz.: the Provengal, 
closely resembling the North- Western dialects of Italy ; along the 
Rhone, and extending to the Alps. The Langue d'oc, extending 
from Auvergne to the Pyrenees, resembles the Romansh, The Gas- 
con, including the Limousin, strongly aspirated. The old Poitevin, 
cultivated as a poetical dialect, in the twelfth century. These are all 
derived from the Langtie d'oc. 

The Western dialects are the modern Poitevin, the Vendean, the 
Augevin, and the Orleannois, the most cultivated, from the former re- 
sidence of the court at Orleans. 

The Northern dialects are the common Parisian, a corrupt dialect ; 
the Norman, — the old Norman found in the early English law-books ; 
the Picard, very rude ; the Walloon, on the frontiers f the Nether- 
lands, very corrupt, mixed with Flemish ; the Lotharingian, Vosgien, 
&c. in the North-East, approach the Dutch ; the Burgundian ; the 
Swiss-French or Vaudois, very lisping, resembles the Romansh, spo- 
ken in Porentru, Neufchatel, part of Freyburg, Vaud, Geneva, part of 
Savoy, and the lower Valois. 

Having thus briefly reviewed the rise and progress of the four lead- 
ing languages of the Continent of Europe, it will not be irrelevant to 
the plan of these "remarks" if we here make some attempt to trace 
the course of the 

ENGLISH. 

The root of the English is Low Dutch. After England had been 
successively occupied by the Gauls, the Belgae, and the Romans, it 
was invaded by the Angles and Saxons, two tribes of Low Dutch from 
the Elbe, who conquered it. The Union of the Heptarchy united 
them, and formed the basis of the English, in its first period — the 
Anglo-Saxon. 

The Danes next invaded and conquered the island, and gave a new 
modification to the language, constituting its second period, — the 



OF CERTAIN MODERN LANGUAGES. 47 

Danish-Saxon : many remains of this period are extant, few of the 
former. 

The Norman conquest, and the establishment of the Norman 
French, as the language of law and government, gave a new modifi- 
cation, the Norman-Saxon. 

The long wars with France increased the stock of French words, 
and when the vernacular language was made the language of law by 
Edward I., it had widely departed from the old Saxon. It now took 
that form which is called old-English, — the language of WicklirTe and 
Chaucer. 

The influence of the French still continued, and the Reformation 
and the revival of letters brought in a large stock of Latin. The lan- 
guage now became fully formed in the period of Elizabeth, and has 
since been advancing, through an uninterrupted series, to its present 
state. No language has been more highly cultivated than the Eng- 
lish, and none can boast a greater list of writers in every branch of 
literature, such as Chaucer, Spenser, Shakspeare, Milton, Dryden, 
Pope, Thompson, Cowper, Wordsworth, Byron, Bacon, Hooker, 
Taylor, Clarendon, Addison, Swift, Johnson, Goldsmith, Burke, Hume, 
Scott, Robertson, Gibbon, Fielding, and others, too well known to re- 
quire recapitulation. 

The language, in its present form, is about equally made up of 
Gothic and Latin derivatives ; hence it has the aspect of a double 
language. It is the simplest of all European languages, direct in its 
structure, almost without inflexions, and supplying their place by 
auxiliaries : in its pronunciation it is smoother and closer than the 
German, and has more of the softness of the Roman languages of 
Southern Europe. 

The cultivated English is written and spoken with uniformity among 
all the educated classes of the British islands, the British colonies, 
and the United States. It is the established language of the British 
government and the United States, and is thus more widely diffused 
than any other language, except the Spanish. It is spoken, through- 
out the United States with scarcely any difference of dialect. In the 
British islands the provincial dialects are numerous, from the want of 
a general diffusion of education. The principal are the Devonshire, 
Lancashire, Yorkshire, Northumbrian, Lowland Scotch, &c. It is 
spoken in all those districts not occupied by the Celtic languages. 

The assertion that the study of Greek and Latin is necessary to the 
attainment of a correct knowledge of English has been so often re- 
peated, that it is now very generally taken for granted and believed. 
Does not such an assertion and such a belief amount to something 
little short of an unwarrantable reflection on the framers, revisers, on 



48 REMARKS ON THE ORIGIN AND STUDY 

all, in short, under whatsoever denomination they may come, wha 
have had any share in bringing the English language to its present 
polish and accuracy ? Let the points of analogy, which the case de- 
mands, be once established, and it will be something to the purpose. 
But this cannot be done, because very few, if any, points of analogy, 
are really to be found. Indeed, so faint is the resemblance to be 
traced between the construction of the English language and that of 
ancient Greece and Rome, that any argument on either relation must 
be drawn, not from what is, but from what is not; while daily experi- 
ence confirms the fact that the more a grammarian tries to harmonize 
the discrepancies betwixt any two languages, the more perplexed, and, 
consequently, the less intelligible he becomes. The primary laws, 
and what is called the philosophy of language, ever remain essentially 
the same ; but, from the time of the grand division at Babel to the 
present, the modifications and diversities in construction, over ihe sur- 
face of the globe, have been endless. It is true that since custom 
among the English established the study of Greek and Latin as an in- 
dispensable part of certain professional qualifications, many terms of 
art have flowed in from that prolific source. This, however, only cor- 
roborates an expression, as happy as it is true, lately made by a learn- 
ed gentleman* of this section, that " in their connection with the Eng- 
lish, the Greek and Latin languages were rather a kind of super- 
structure than a foundation." 

If, notwithstanding, the derivation and composition of words is, in 
itself, a consideration sufficiently weighty to demand the actual study 
of foreign languages in order to improve and facilitate an acquain- 
tance with our own, why not rather insist on the advantage derivable 
from the Saxon character, the French, or the German, as the parent 
stem ? — Both among the people and at the Court of England, the 
Saxon and the French, in the times of early history, appear to have 
held disputed sway. For a long period, before and after the invasion 
of England by duke William, commonly called the Conqueror, the 
French was in great use there. The historian, Beda, affirms that in 
the year 640 it was the custom of England to send their daughters 
into the monasteries of France, to- be brought up there; and that 
Ethelbert, Ethelwolf, Ethelred, and other Saxon kings, married into 
the royal blood of France. Glabor notes that before the time of duke 
William, the Normans and English did so Jink together, that they were 
a terror to foreign nations. Ingulphus saith, the Saxon hand was used 
until the time of king Alfred, long before the time of duke William ; 



• The Rev. Moses Raymond, of Hampshire county, Virginia. 



OF CERTAIN MODERN LANGUAGES. 



& 



and that he, being brought up by French teachers, used the French 
hand; and he notes many charters of Eldred and Edgar written in the 
French hand, and some Saxon mixed with it, as in the book of 
Doomsday ; that Edward the Confessor, by reason of his totig being 
in France, was turned into the French fashion, and all England with 
him : but that William the First commanded the laws to be written in 
the English tongue, because most men understood it, and that there 
be many of his patents in the Saxon tongue." 

Giraldus Cambrensis notes, that the English tongue was in great 
use in Bourdeaux, and in other parts of France, where Englishmen 
were resident and conversant : the like was when the Frenchmen 
were so conversant in England. 

Matthew Westminster writes, that he was in hazard of losing his 
living because he understood not the French tongue ; and that in 
king Henry II. and king Stephen's time, who had large dominions in 
France, their native country, the number of French, and of matches 
with them, was so great, that one could hardly know who was French 
and who was English. Gervasius Tilburensis observes the same ; and 
Brackland writes, that in Richard I. time, preaching in England was 
in (he French tongue ; probably pleading might be so likewise ; and 
in king John's time French was accounted as the mother-tongue. 
From the great use of the French tongue in England it was that the 
reporters of law cases and judgments did write their reports in 
French, which was the pure French in that time, though mixed with 
some words of art. These terms of art were [taken, many of them, 
from the Saxon tongue, as may be seen by those yet used. 

Of these and other historical facts connected with the subject an 
elaborate digest may be found in a paliamentary speech on " A pro- 
posal to have the Old Laws translated from the French into English" 
delivered in the British House of Commons, A. D. 1650, by an emi- 
nent barrister, Mr. Whitlocke, who adds : 

" I shall not deny but some monks, in elder times, and some clerks 
and officers, might have a cunning for their private honour and profit, 
to keep up a mystery, to have as much as they could of our laws to 
be in a kind of mystery to the vulgar, to be the less understood by 
them ; yet the counsellors in law and judges could have no advantage 
in it." 

And farther: 

"As to the debate and matter of the act now before you, I have 
delivered no opinion against it ; nor do I think it reasonable that the 
generality of the people of England should, by an implicit faith, de- 
pend upon the knowledge of others in that which concerns them most 
of all. It was the Romish policv to keep them in ignorance of mat- 
13 ■ 



$0 RBMARKS ON THE ORIGIN AND STUDY 

ters pertaining to their soul's health ; let them not be in ignorance of 
matters pertaining to their bodies, estates, and all their worldly com- 
fort. It is not unreasonable that the law should be in that language, 
which may best be understood by those, whose lives and fortunes are 
subject to it, and are to be governed by it. Moses read all the laws 
openly before the people in their mother-tongue. God directed him 
to write it, and to expound it to the people in their own native lan- 
guage, that what concerned their lives, liberties, and estates, might be 
made known to them in the most perspicuous way. The laws of the 
Eastern nations were in their proper tongue ; the laws at Constanti- 
nople were in Greek ; at Rome, in Latin ; in France, Spain, Ger- 
many, Sweden, Denmark, and other nations, their laws were publish- 
ed in their native idiom. For our own country, there is no man that 
can read the Saxon character, but may find the laws of your ancestors 
yet extant, in the English tongue. Duke William himself command- 
ed the laws to be proclaimed in English, that none might pretend 
ignorance of them. It was the judgment of the parliament, 36 Ed- 
ward III., that pleadings should be in English ; and in the reigns of 
those kings when our statutes were enrolled in French and English, 
yet then the sheriffs in their several counties were to proclaim them 
in English." 

Thus, I think, it is placed beyond the reach of doubt or contradic- 
tion which of the two languages, French and Latin, as compared with 
the English now in use, deserves the most attention in regard to pro- 
bable analogy of idiomatical construction, and even the derivation of 
words. It is no where shown, no where contended, that the tempo- 
rary possession of the British materially affected the vernacular idiom 
in England. In town and country Saxon and French were the popu- 
lar tongues ; while Latin was entirely a scholastic concern ; its pecu- 
liar sphere, — the cloister; its principal requisition, — that of Monkish 
mystery and the enrolment of the laws, and, it may be added, the 
emolument of the lawyers. But the books of the law themselves 
were subsequently translated into English, particularly about Edward 
the Third's time. 

Reverting to the assertion that Greek and Latin are necessary to 
accomplish the study of English, may it not be almost inferred that 
the very sound of such a phrase betrays a want of patriotism in those 
who use it ? Have there not figured in the world statesmen, lawyers, 
divines, physicians, poets, orators, men of eminence in every walk of 
life, whose book-learning was limited to the works of their compatriots 
and to those of foreigners translated into their native tongue ? Un- 
der parallel circumstances, that which in one ago and nation is anti- 
patriotic becomes equally so in another. The Roman Lyrist, in on© 



01 CERTATN MODERN LANGUAGES. 51 

of his most finished Odes, ingenuously relates of himself that M once 
upon a time," while musing in deep reverie, on the plan of enriching 
the Latin vocabulary and decorating the poetical diction of his coun- 
try by the introduction of foreign idioms, the Muse or guardian Geniui 
of the land appeared, and, with an air of rebuke, ordered the bard 
to banish the unworthy design, and content himself with exploring 
and bringing to the light of day, the unlocked treasures of his native 
language, instead of tainting the purity of its source by extraneous 
admissions. ■ 

It will not, surely, be'denied, that for all purposes of Art or Elo- 
quence the English language is a well of supply equally unfailing. 
Moreover, let it be remembered that former things have now passed 
away ; — a different spirit is now moving on the face of the earth. The 
study of Greek and Latin, as a matter of necessity, is now no longer 
indispensable. We live in a day when the reputation of taste and 
good sense is not confined to an acquaintance with the Greek and 
Latin authors, and it is not thought necessary to a man's understand- 
ing an eloquent discourse, or even to his making one, that he should 
ever have read a definition either of logic or rhetoric. 

Little need be added to the above observations. This review of the 
subject, however imperfect, will probably suffice to place the lan- 
guages of ancient Greece and Rome and the modern English in their 
true relative position. But fashion deigns to play a part in the affair, 
and hence it is led to assume a more serious aspect. Be the theatre 
of its operation where it may, Fashion, confessedly too strong for the 
law, will ever enact the usurper. Not the sons alone, but the daugh- 
ters of the land, are, " now-a-days," to be marshalled in the ranks of 
the "learned Thebans " of our College Halls. Certainly, if any pa- 
rent does not think, with Milton, that " one tongue is enough for a 
woman," let such parent have his daughter instructed in two, or 
twenty. In the way of language, I dare say, there is no difficulty 
which a female cannot readily conquer. Cleopatra, of old, is an in- 
stance in point: in modern times, Madame Dacier, in France, and 
Mrs. Carter, in England, were among the best Greek and Latin scho- 
lars of the times they flourished in : their names are the boast of 
classical criticism. But is it society at large, or the sedentary student 
in his closet, that has most profited by the literary labours of these 
talented women? It must always be borne in mind, that, for practical 
application, the Latin language is restricted to the very limited circle 
of the literati or school-men. To them, living in different parts of the 
world, and imperfectly, or, perhaps, not at all acquainted with each 
other's tongue, the ability to write in Latin forms a convenient medium 
of communication and controversy. 



52 REMARKS ON THE ORIGIN AND STUDY 

To return to Madame Dacier and Mrs. Carter. — The case of these 
formidable female Drawcansirs was peculiar. With them classical 
study was a business, and a serious business, too, absorbing all other 
considerations. They had the courage to dive deeply into the criti- 
cism of classical erudition ; and thus they became critics in their turn. 
In consequence of this they had a literary character at stake, the 
jealous support of which, at any sacrifice, did in a manner force on 
them the necessity of extending their researches to the utmost. How 
far such a course may coincide with feminine taste and feminine avo- 
cations, generally, I leave for others to determine. For myself,. I 
should rather suppose that some modern and living language, — some 
one equally flexible, whether for conveying the vigorous sallies of vyit 
and exuberant fancy, or the social recreation of conversational inter- 
course, would be preferable. Such, for example, is the language of 
France, Spain, or Italy. To the taste and opportunities of a young, 
intelligent female, such a study may be accounted quite congenial. 
Can it be questioned which is best calculated to win the fair student's 
choice — the freshness of a poetical wreath woven from the " ever- 
blooming garden" of Ariosto, Tasso, Petrarca ; or the age-worn 
h$ s of Anacreontic, Catullian, or Propertian flowers, which, undying 
though they are, Time's despoiling touch has dimmed, if unable to 
destroy ? 

To be sure, we know there is no accounting for taste. English 
historians have drawn a picture of personal and mental excellence in 
the character of the Lady Jane Grey, who, at an age almost puerile, 
M derived more pleasure in her closet from the study of Plato, in the 
original Greek, than her gay companions from the sports of the chase." 
The sad fate of this unfortunate Lady is touching, and might well 
move the sympathy of the sternest heart. There is, however, — it 
must be acknowledged, — something extremely frigid in the narrative 
that, when led forth to execution, pausing awhile over the body of her 
beheaded husband, she calmly and deliberately composes and writes 
in her tablets a moral sentiment in three different languages, Greek, 
Latin, and English. Will it be deemed harsh to declare an opinion, 
that, in a display of learning like this, there is something too much of 
pedantry, or singularity, at the least ? 

I shall here close these "remarks" with a few lines bearing on the 
subject of the French language, taken from Franklin's letter, address- 
ed to Noah Webster, jun., on the " Modern Innovations in the Eng- 
lish language and in Printing." 

" The Latin language," says Doctor Franklin, " long the vehicle 
used in distributing knowledge among the different nations of Europe, 
•is daily more and more neglected ; and one of the modern tongues, 



OF CERTAIN MODERN LANGUAGES. 53 

jsamely, French, seems, in point of universality, to have supplied its 
place. It is spoken in all the courts of Europe ; and most of the 
literati, those even who do not speak it, have acquired a knowledge 
of it, to enable them easily t© read the books that are witten in it. 
This gives a considerable advantage to that nation. It enables its au- 
thors to inculcate and spread through other nations, such sentiments 
and opinions, on important points, as are most conducive to its in- 
terests, or which may contribute to its reputation, by promoting the 
common interests of mankind." 

And farther : 

"At present there is no capital town in Europe without a French 
bookseller's shop corresponding with Paris. Our English bids fair to 
obtain the second pkce. The great body of excellent printed ser- 
mons in our language, and the freedom of our writing on political 
subjects, have induced a great number of divines, of different sects 
and nations, as well as gentlemen concerned in public affairs, to study 
it so far at least as to read it. And if we were to endeavour the fa- 
cilitating its progress, the study of our tongue might become much 
more general." 



tlF 



*<h i ,.£, 



w { 



u .1 



APPENDIX. 



APPENDIX. 



A. 

'" The attention of the poetical populace of the present day to ob- 
tain an ostracism against Pope is as easily accounted for as the Athe- 
nian's shell against Aristides : they are tired of hearing him always 
called " the just." They are also righting for life ; for if he maintains 
his station, they will reach their own falling. They have raised a 
mosque by the side of a Grecian temple of the purest Architecture; 
and, more barbarous than the barbarians from whose practice I have 
borrowed the figure, they are not contented with their own grotesque 
edifice unless they destroy the prior and purely beautiful fabric which 
preceded, and which shames them and theirs for ever and ever. I 
shall be told, that amongst those I have been (or, it may be, still am) 
conspicuous — true, and I am ashamed of it. I have been amongst 
the builders of the Babel, attended by a confusion of tongues, but 
never amorjgst the envious destroyers of the classic temple of our 
predecessor. I have loved and honored the fame and name of that 
illustrious and unrivalled man, far more than my own paltry renown, 
and the trashy jingle of the "schools" and upstarts, who pretend to 
rival and even surpass him. Sooner than a single leaf should be torn 
from his laurel, it were better that all which these men, and that I, as 
one of their set, have ever written, should 

" ' Line trunks, clothe spice, or, fluttering in a row, 
• Befringe the rails of Bedlam of Soho.' 

" There are those who will believe this, and those who will not. 
You, Sir, know how far I am sincere, and whether my opinion, not 
only in this short work intended for publication, and in private letters 
which can never 'be published, has or has not been the same. I look 
upon this as the declining age of English poetry ; no regard for others, 
no selfish feeling, can prevent me from seeing this, and expressing 
the truth. There can be no worse sign for the depreciation of the 
times than the depreciation of Pope. It would be better to re- 
ceive for proof Mr. Cobbet's rough but strong attack upon Shaks- 
peare and Milton, than to allow this smooth and "candid" under- 
mining reputation of the most " perfect" of our poets, and the purest 
14 



5g APPENDIX. 

of our moralists. Of his power in the passions, in description, in the 
mock-heroic, I leave others to descant. I take him on his strong 
ground, as an ethical poet : in the former none excel ; in the mock 
heroic and the ethical none equal him ; and, in my mind, the latter is 
the highest of all poetry, because it does that in verse which the 
greatest of men have wished to accomplish in prose.* If the essence 
of poetry must be a lie, throw it to the dogs, or banish it from your 
republic, as Plato would have done. He who can reconcile poetry 
with truth and wisdom, is the only true "poet " in its real sense ; " the 
maker, 5 ' the," creator "—why must this mean the "liar," the " feign- 
er," the "tale-teller?" — A man may make and create better things 
than these." — Byron's Letter on Bowles's Strictures on Pope. 

B. 

Gratus Alexandre regi Magno fuit ille 

Choerilus, incultis qui versibus et male natis 

Rettulit acceptos, regale numisma, Philippos. 

Sed, veluti tractata notam labemque remittunt 

Atramenta, fere scriptores carmine fasdo 

Splendida facta linunt. Idem rex ille, poema 

Qui tarn ridiculum tarn care prodigus emit, 

Edicto vetuit ne quis se, preeter Apellen, 

Pingeret, aut alius Lysippo duceret sera 

Fortis Alexandri vultum simulantia. Quod si 

Judicium subtile videndis artibus illud 

Ad libros et ad ha3C Musarum dona vocares, 

Bosotum in crasso jurares acre natum. — Hor. Ep. lib. 2. L 



Milton's biographers relate that his daughters could read, but not 
translate, several languages, both living and dead, — a practice they 
were obliged to exercise as some relief to the poet's blindness. Mil- 
ton being once asked why his daughters were not instructed in the 
sense as well as the sound of those various languages, is said to have 
replied that "one tongue was enough for a woman." 



* Poetry is sublime when it awakens in the mind any great and good affection, as 
piety or patriotism. This is one of the noblest effects of the Art. The Psalms are 
remarkable, beyond all other writings, for their power of inspiring devout emo- 
tions.— Beattie on the Excellence of the Holy Scriptures. 



APPENDIX. DU 

D. 

In making free with the name, opinions, and expressions of Doctor 
Franklin in the preceding pages, I would have it distinctly understood, 
that it is by no means done with the view of insinuating that he held 
the study of tGreek and Latin in no esteem. His correspondence on 
the subject of the Philadelphia Academy proves the contrary. To 
this study Franklin, no doubt, assigned its just value : no one should 
be required to do more : but he might still be averse to its obtaining a 
preponderating influence, especially as he had full and frequent op- 
portunities of observing the pernicious results of such a system in the 
Public Schools of England, — a conjecture much strengthened by the 
fact of his drawing out a precautionary plan for organizing the studies 
of the English classes, which plan was to be submitted to the Trus- 
tees of the then newly projected Institution at Philadelphia. 






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